Character Creation: League of Seekers

If I heard this title in a vacuum, I'd think it was a pulpy adventure game in the vein of, well, Adventure! or Temples & Tombs or something. Actually, in a vacuum I wouldn't hear anything at all, but you know what I mean.

The Game: League of Seekers
The Publisher: FeralGamersInc? Broken Rat Games? 
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

This game Kickstarted in 2018, it was apparently on DriveThruRPG at one point because it's in my library there, but it's not available for sale anywhere I can see on a cursory glance. And like...yeah, I can kinda see why. 

It reminds me a lot of Dark Aeons, another thoroughly mediocre Lovecraft-inspired game. There are some kernels of interesting stuff, but for the most part it's not doing anything new, and holy hell does this book need an editor. Lots of sentence fragments, misuse of "effect" vs. "affect", and Strong Bad seriously needs to sing the author his Rhythm & Grammar song about "its" vs. "it's." Interestingly, there is no credited editor. 

But never mind that. The game starts out with a timeline that takes us from AD 730 all the way to AD 1765. I think what we're going for here is something like Unhallowed Metropolis where the supernatural has basically taken over, the history talks about "spheres" opening, but it's never quite clear what those mean. Actually if I wasn't as familiar as I am with Lovecraft (and I'm by no means an expert), a lot of that chapter might miss me. 

So we're playing characters who are "Called" or "Awakened" or "Spunky", I forget what the title actually is, and we're working to help protect people from bad shit. And that's not the only way it's like Chill (which is not mentioned in its list of inspirations, and I find that very suspect) - the game system is roll d%, shoot for lower, graduated success based on how much below your stat you roll.

There's some cool-looking artwork in the book, anyway. Cover's pretty dope. Not sure if having "I'll kill you" in funky letters at the bottom of the cover is really in-tone, but whatever. Let's make a character! 

I got all excited because I saw "life paths", but although you could call this chargen system a "life path" system, it's pretty anemic. Better than nothing, though, and it means I don't have to figure out a concept before starting. 

So first we roll to see if we're a peasant, middle class, or noble. Got an 80% chance of peasant, but let's try it...hey, 95! I'm middle class! I could also be a member of the secretive Akhua sect, but it sounds too much like "Hawk Tuah" for me (I'm kidding, I just don't want to bother with the weird shit today). 

I'll note this stuff down later, I know better than to write anything on a character sheet in a lifepath system until things firm up a little. 

My Dark Knowledge starts at 1d6%, whatever that means. Hey, rolled a 6, that's as much I could know!

I get "Logical" as a Trait, and then I can pick Educated, Respected, or Fencer as a Talent. Hell, let's take Fencer. 

Now we roll for a few things:

Birthplace: Town. (As opposed to a city.) I get Commerce 10, Travel 10, Eloquence 1, Fitness 1. 

Education: Church School! That's an interesting combination with Fencer. I get Arcane 1 and Dark Knowledge d6%...hang on, 5, putting me up to 11, meaning I get a point of Insight (again, whatever that means). 

Early Career: Officer. Well, that makes more sense with Fencer. I get Melee, Toughness, and Sneak 10.

Now we do a Tale of Horror! The way this works is that I get a writing prompt, and I take it an run. I can use it to justify a 5% bump to three Skills, but every one after the first also requires a 5% penalty to a Skill (all justified by the Tale). 

Rolling, my prompt is: "As the moon turned red my own men began to change before my eyes...". 

Well, this implies that we were out on campaign or something. Let's say that I was in command of a platoon or whatever, and I'd sent out scouts the day before to find supplies. They found a small lake that contained what seemed to be clean water, so the men camped by it and drank (I and the other officers stuck to our wine, thanks). The lake, it turns out, was connected to...something. The water changed them, they grew...parts that weren't human or even mammalian. The other officers went mad or were swarmed and killed, but I got on my horse and got the hell out. 

So what Skills are implied by this? I think Travel (which covers horse riding), Stealth (because I got away), and Willpower (because I got away and didn't go crazy) all make sense. I need two penalized Skills, though. Let's say Memory (much of his brainspace at any given time is taken up by what he saw) and Diplomacy (talking to people just doesn't come naturally anymore). 

I get a Statement, which just gives me a bonus in a particular situation. Let's say that "I am well-traveled," which gives me a +10% when "recognising other cultures." I don't think "recognize" is the verb you want here, friend. "Oh, look! That culture is German!" Well, whatever, what's next.

Derived traits! Well, guess I should total my Attributes n' shit. Eloquence, Investigate, and Learned start at 4, Fitness, Subterfuge, and Occult at 3, and Conflict and Mind at 2. I get +1 Eloquence and Fitness 'cause I'm from a town, Arcane 1 from my schoolin'. 

Skill Totals: I...huh. I guess how this works is that, for example, for Eloquence, Learned, and Investigate, I get scores of 20, 20, 30, 40, and 50 that I can put into the Skills. There are 5 Skills linked to each Attribute, so presumably I get that spread in each of those categories? This is never explained, and there's no summary or example of chargen. 

Ugh, fine, that means I have to do this for nine different Attributes. Let's start with Conflict (skipping Arcane because evidently I don't get anything in those Skills). I get 5, 5, 10, 20, 30, which is pathetic, but whatevs. I'll put my 30 into Melee, obviously, since I can fence. I'll put the 20 into Ranged, the 10 into Explosives, and 5 into Thrown and Unarmed. I also get a +10 to Melee, so that's 40. 

Eloquence, I get 20, 20, 30, 40, 50, with a -5 in Diplomacy. I'll put my 50 into Etiquette, my 40 into Diplomacy (making it 35), my 30 into Languages, that leaves 20 in Commerce and Deceive. 

Fitness! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, with a +5 in Travel and a +10 in Toughness. I'll put my 40 in Travel (45), my 30 in Toughness (40), my 30 in Resistance, that leaves 20 in Acrobatics and Athletics. 

Investigate! 20, 20, 30, 40, 50, let's put 50 into Notice, 40 into Search, 30 into Research, 20s in Track and Detect (side note: Detect, Notice, and Search are all discrete skills? Just...why?). 

Learned! 20, 20, 30, 40, 50. Well, 50 into History, 40 into Academia, 30 into Theology, 20s in Mythology and Medical. 

Mind! 5, 5, 10, 20, 30, with a -5 to Memory and a +5 to Willpower. 30 into Cunning, 20 into Willpower (25), 10 into Memory (5), leaving 5 in Dream and Logic.

Occult! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, why on Earth is this higher than Mind for a Middle Class person? Was "middle class" even a thing in the 18th century? Anyway, 40 into Demonology, 30 into Folk Tales, 20 into Cults, leaving 10 in Divination and Xenology. 

Subterfuge! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, with a +10 in Sneak and a +5 in Stealth. What on Earth is the difference between Sneak and Stealth? Oh, there isn't actually a Sneak Skill. Probably it was called that at some point and just never changed, must actually mean Stealth, which means I get +15 there. Cool. 40 into Stnealthk (55, making it by far my best Skill), 30 into Tinker, 20 into Forgery, 10s in Disguise and Steal. 

I get a d4 as my experience die and...OK. Every time I get a critical success or failure, I can roll my XP die and bump the Skill by that much. I actually kinda like that. But the die size is based on Mind + Learned. This means that bookworms are better at improving everything, including, say, combat Skills, and who gets a crit isn't meaningfully different, because you get a crit fail by rolling 99 or 00, and a crit success by rolling under the Attribute linked to the Skill you were using (so at best a 5% chance). 

Anyway, my Damage Bonus is also a d4, my Insanity is 12...wait, do you mean Sanity? 'Cause there's no Insanity Trait on the sheet. Whatever. Reason is "the first number of Willpower" JESUS CHRIST DO YOU MEAN THE TENS DIGIT? Ahem. That's 2 for me. Injury is the "first number" of Toughness (4), Wounds are 12 (but that's true for everyone), and Insight is 0 but 1 for me because I have Dark Knowlege (wwooOOOOooooo). 

Now I get a superpower! I'm Awakened, so I get something quasi magical. It's random, so...03 gives me Corpse Tongue, which keys off of Mind. Great, my lowest Attribute. That means I have to roll under 20 to use it. What's it let me do, anyway? Communicate with corpses and ask basic questions. Well, that's not the worst thing I could have rolled; my guy did see a lot of death. 

Oh, Languages. My Learned is 4, so I speak two, obviously English and French (and I probably should read Latin, too, but there's no way to simulate that and I do not care that much). 

OK, so: Jonathan Nelmes attended church school but didn't really have the temperament to be a vicar. He wound up enlisting and becoming an officer through a combination of luck, cleverness, and fencing skill, and when he was finally given his first squad (I'd figure out what war or campaign he was in if I cared, but a) the history of this world is a little screwy because of the monsters and b) I don't) that's when the "everyone's a bug" thing happened. 

Jonathan used to be very put together and clean-cut. He's...rather let himself go. Scraggly hair, uneven beard, dirty hands, he still wears his uniform but it's dirty beyond recognition. Somewhere in here he discovered he can (unreliably) talk to corpses, and that hasn't helped the old mental state any. 

Right, good, done, not a fan of this one. Also there's no reason this sheet couldn't have been a single page.

Character Creation: Midnight of the Century

Cheer up. The world's about to end in ten minutes anyway.

The Game: Midnight of the Century
The Publisher: By Odin's Beard RPG
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Midnight of the Century is a game I wanted to like more than I do. I do like it, mind - it's an investigative horror game that actually does do something different than Chill. It's designed to emulate the dark investigation stories of the 90s, stuff like Millennium, Se7en, Silence of the Lambs, and so on. You're playing Investigators who are tracking down serial killers, but there is also a "you're part of a shadowy conspiracy" and a "by the way, the world is ending" component to the game. Setting-wise, there's almost nothing about it I dislike. 

System...eh. I mean, I think it's probably fine. It's OSR-inspired, but not actually OSR, so it's not like...what the hell was that weird game that the author gave up on? John Silence. Anyway, the stats aren't the standard D&D ones, so the creators obviously put more thought into it than "iunno, rulings not rules". I think I would like it better if it were something like Gumshoe or Forged in the Dark, but that's a personal preference thing. 

The thing that I get hung up on is that the book says it works best with one or two players plus a GM. I...never have only two players. If I do, I cancel the game and do something else. Four is my sweet spot, three is OK with the right game (I ran a whole Slipstream campaign with three players, but it definitely changed the calculus of designing encounters), two or one feels weird to me. And I like this setup of this game so much, I'm sure I could probably figure out making it work with more players.

For now, however, let's make an Investigator, which is like an alligator, only investi. 

I actually do have something of a concept, here; it's a character I've had in my brain for a while but never had the right game for it (and frankly probably isn't a character I'd actually play unless everyone at the table was super cool with it). My idea is someone who was a serial killer, but then had a brain tumor removed from his head and became "cured." It sounds like something that would have happened on Criminal Minds, and in a setting where demons exist, I can also see doing a kind of Malignant thing with it and having the tumor actually be a demon or something. My character doesn't need to know anything about demons, of course, just that he used to have these urges, he acted on them a couple of times, got caught, did time in prison, was diagnosed with brain cancer, and had a lot of sciencey people (from the Ouroboro corporation, in setting) poking at him and theorizing that the tumor fucking up his ability to feel...much of anything, but certainly empathy was responsible. And then he had brain surgery, and wound up being able to remember what he did but to appreciate it like a non-psychopath. 

So after his second suicide attempt, he wound up reading in the papers about an active killer in the Pacific Northwest (where this game is set by default) and contacting someone he'd met from Ouroboro with some insight. Ouroboro pulled some strings and got him released to their custody, but he's basically on permanent house arrest. He's enthusiastic about the work (tracking down killers), partially because he's got skin in the game in a way a lot of other investigators don't, but also because he expects - wants - for one of these bastards to kill him someday. 

There, that's appropriately bleak. There's a table with random names in this book, so let's use it! Rolling a d100 twice, I get...42 and 42. Huh, what are the odds. (1 in a 100, Matt.) Anyway, that gives me "Gregory Howard" as a name, which is fine by me.

My age is 30+4d6...a roll of 15 means I'm 45. Let's say he was in prison for the last 10 years, so he was killing in his early 30s. 

Traits! These are game stats (that's next), these are physical and personality traits. I'll roll them randomly, but I reserve the right countermand anything stupid. 

Physique: Lean. That's fine.

Face: Bony. Aside from rolling two 1s in a row, that's fine too.

Skin: Scarred. Obviously I didn't make it out of prison unscathed, which makes sense.

Eyes: Shining. I...huh? I don't think that tracks. I choose to pretend I roll a 7 instead, giving me "searching" eyes.

Hair: Matted. Sure, that's fine. 

Speech: Blunt. Yeah, that's good. Greg isn't interested in playing around. He knows what other people think of him, they're right, he is a monster, so what if he doesn't have the urge to do monstrous things anymore. 

Virtue/Vice: Cautious/Aggressive. First of all, those don't work for Greg, and second, they're almost antonyms. Let's try again. Ambitious/Cold. I'm OK with "cold," but "ambitious" doesn't work for me. Let's take "upbeat," just because it's such a juxtaposition. Greg is jovial and dry, but that's part defense mechanism for himself and partly for others. If he's never serious, if his humor is kinda gallows, then other people can hate him and that's just easier. 

Clothing/style: We've got an 80% chance of being "corporate" here, and...look at that, I roll within that margin. Eh, Ouroboro probably dresses me anyway. 

Stats! Body, Mind, Will, roll 3d6 in order and then swap any two. This gives me: Body 14, Mind 10, Will 15. Well, I'm gonna swap Body and Mind.

Specialism! Class, more or less. I want Greg to be a Profiler, his insight is valuable because he can think like a killer. That gives me +2 Mind.

Psych profile! More random tables, but I'm probably gonna pick these. But let's see. 

How did you become a profiler? Yeah, "cancer-induced serial killer" isn't on the random table. Why did you leave the agency? Oh, right, this assumes profilers are LEOs. OK, I'm going to skip these questions because they don't apply. 

Bonds! I get three, again rolled randomly, and this time I think it's fine to do so. My Connection Bond is...a lover. Oh, hell. Yeah, I'm OK with that. Her name is Kelly Martel (another random name). Kelly is one of those serial killer groupies who wound up tracking Greg down after his "release" and making contact, and she is literally the one person Greg ever lets his guard down to. My Haven is...a tattoo shop! Yeah, Greg has some prison tats (some of them given against his will) and he's gone into Gone Baby Gone Tattoo (owner's a big Violent Femmes fan) a bunch to get them covered up. And, finally, Vehicle...hatchback. Yeah, that's fine.

Equipment is just common sense plus the stuff my specialism gets me, which is...a picture of Kelly, some painkillers, and some latex gloves. And then I get a pager, a notebook and a pen, and a flashlight. I think I'm also required to check in with Ouroboro every day. 

And that's it! Greg is a white guy in his mid-40s, a bunch of tats on his arms and scars on his face. He's lean because he doesn't eat much, his hair is matted because there's a bunch of scar tissue on his scalp and his hair grows in weird. 

I think, again, that provided the other players are cool with it, Greg would be an interesting character study in silly things like "forgiving yourself" and whether it's possible to atone for doing something terrible. 

Movie #969: Alvin & The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel

Alvin & The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, in case the clever wordplay goes over your head, is the second (OF THREE) sequels to Alvin & the Chipmunks. Obviously. It stars Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler, Jesse McCartney, Jason Lee, David Cross, Amy Poehler, Christina Applegate, Anna Faris, Wendie Malick, and Zachary Levi. 

We pick up with the titular Chipmunks, Alvin (Long), Simon (Gubler), and Theodore (McCartney) doing their schtick where they sing pop songs in squeaky voices, when their manager/adopted father falls victim to a cartoonish injury and winds up in traction in France (if this had happened in the US, it wouldn't have worked because the US health care system would have discharged him the same day). Anyway, the Chipmunks are sent to stay with their friendly Aunt Jackie (Kathryn Joosten), but she almost immediately falls victim to a similar accident and this leaves the boys in the care of their slacker cousin Toby (a pre-Shazam Levi). 

Part of Dave's instructions was for them to have a normal childhood, so they're getting sent to school. This turns out to be high school, which was jarring because before this I realized I had no context for how old these mutant rodents were supposed to be. I mean, they're all "sassy" and talk like teenagers, or rather, they talk like how a middle-aged screenwriter thinks a teenager in 2009 might talk ("oh, it's on like Donkey Kong!" "Right back atcha!" "I can't hear you over [whatever]". Stuff like that). Anyway, they go to high school, where they are immediately beset by bullies who try to kill them (what is this, the 80s?) and the principal (Malick), who happens to be a Chipmunks superfan, tells them they have to represent the school in a music festival because if they win, the prize money will pay for the school's flagging music program!

So we've got like six different cartoon plots already, but we're not done! The evil former music exec Ian Hawke (Cross), living like a mad hobo in the basement of the record company building, gets a FedEx package with the Chipettes, the female versions of the Chipmunks. Like, literally, we've got the sassy one, Brittany (Applegate), the one with glasses, Jeanette (Faris), and the fat/loveable one, Eleanor (Poehler). And sure, let's talk about this here.

The Chipettes are literally just girl versions of their respective Chipmunks, just a little less-than. Brittany is a less-assholish Alvin, Jeanette is a less-smart Simon, and Eleanor is...well, Eleanor is about the same as Theodore. Less cowardly, maybe. They get almost no characterization. I'm not saying the Chipmunks are fleshed-out characters, but they at least all have a little personality. I was there in the 80s when the girl-versions of characters appeared, I know this song. 

Anyway, the plot is stitched together from multiple cliches. We've got Alvin joining the jocks and blowing off his family, the Chipettes vs. the Chipmunks as they're manipulated by Hawke, and Toby learning to come out of his shell and talk to his high school crush, Julie (Anjelah Johnson, utterly wasted in this role). If you've been awake for the last 20 years, you know every beat before it happens, and for those of us in Gen X who watched the cartoon, there's a palpable sense of déjà vu. Anyway, it ends up with both groups performing together (obviously) and the Chipettes moving in with the Chipmunks (obviously). 

I just...I think my biggest problem here is that I don't get the appeal. I mean, the Chipmunks have always had the same gimmick (again, pop songs in a squeaky voice) but the 80s cartoon had the benefit of cartoony adventures n' shit. This is that schtick with cliché plots, hackneyed dialog, and some truly mediocre CGI. And there's a cameo from a...sewer gopher? that the movie clearly thought I should recognize. I had to look him up; it's a thing called Digger (Dave Bauza), who was a mascot for NASCAR on Fox until the head of Fox Sports apologized for him. 

People talk about Marvel movies being soulless corporate affairs, but to me, this is the kind of thing that makes me want to make movies made in the 70s. It's real bad...

...but it's somehow better than the first one. I don't mean it's good, I hasten to add. It's like how stubbing your toe is better than getting kicked in the balls. I don't want either one, neither one is fun or good, but if I have to experience one or the other, I'll pick the one that has a timely reference to another, better movie (that'd be Alvin - remember, voiced by Justin Long - reminding us during a dodgeball game of the five Ds of dodgeball). 

Wish I could've dodged this movie! HAHAHAHAHAHAi'mgonnakillyoutoasty

My Grade: D
Rewatch Value: IINSIAIFWT

Next up: John Dies at the End (for reals this time!)

D&D: The Rich Man

Ho, there! Last time, our heroes fought a snakelike monster in the ruins of a mysterious city. This time, no one ran the risk of being swallowed, so that's good.

Our heroes, having retrieved Aisling's harp-lute from the hidey-hole and bade farewell to their erstwhile companion Brébhin, set out north to the city of Cian. They're a few days out when they pick up a strange trail - a caravan, consisting of six wagons pulled by horses, and with a few folks in good-quality shoes walking alongside. This is somewhat perplexing; merchant caravans aren't unknown, but they usually aren't this big or this well-appointed.

They catch up with said caravan a day later, and see that it's entered a valley. As they're about to make themselves known, Dara spots people on the ridge on either side of the valley, clearly a bandit company ready to spring! 

Zook rolls up his sleeves to ready a fireball, but someone points out that if he blows up part of the ridge, it might collapse down on the caravan. And besides, says Fearg, do we really want to kill all these people? Zook opines that it's no different than killing monsters or kobolds, but there's a prevailing feeling of disagreement, and Keenan points out that these bandits haven't actually done anything yet - slaughtering them en masse seems extreme. Zook grudgingly agrees, but does note that his spell repertoire doesn't include a lot of non-lethal options. 

Clara scampers up the left side of the valley, and Dara goes right. Clara sees that these are indeed brigands - they wear a mishmash of armor and carry makeshift weapons, cudgels and shillelagh and the like. She spots one bandit in studded armor giving orders, but then he notices Dara on the other side of the ridge making her way towards the bandits there and signals them. And at that point, the attack begins!

Several of the bandits, including the captain, slide down the hill into the valley, draw weapons, and start attacking the guards walking with the caravan. Clara runs up and downs one of the remaining thugs easily, and on the other side of the valley, Dara conjures a wind wall to block off the valley. A couple of the bandits, already heading for the slope, hit the wall and get blown back. 

Zook and Keenan join Dara. Zook throws a magic missile at some of the dudes, hoping to encourage them to flee. Dara, likewise, clonks one on the head and tells him "I could have hit you much harder." He takes the point and runs. One of them runs up to Dara and swings a cudgel, and Keenan (who's also realizing that many of his spells involve fire and are therefore not great for non-lethal combat) casts reduce on the guy, shrinking him to gnome-size!

Meanwhile, Aisling jogs up the side of the valley and throws a hypnotic pattern across a bunch of the bandits, including the captain. They all collapse, charmed and stupefied. Fearg just walks into the valley and one of the thugs runs up and stabs him with a dagger. He looks down at the scratch and bonks the guy with his hammer, but doesn't fell him (and notes that maybe he's not as effective when he's, like, mentally present for a fight).

Up on the ridge, Dara continues her strategy of clonking bandits with a mace and either knocking them out or sending them fleeing. Clara easily fells another, and then slides down the hill, where two more bandits have a guard pushed up against a wagon! They stab him, but then turn to face Clara - and she promptly knocks them both out. Aisling ties up the bandit captain, Keenan shoots a dude in the leg with a crossbow bolt, and Zook drives the rest away with magic missiles.

The bandits either unconscious or routed, the adventurers approach the caravan. Dara and Aisling cast some healing magic at the wounded guards, and the folks riding in the wagons emerge, applauding them. The caravan numbers about 30, and the leader emerges. He's a handsome man in his 30s. His teeth are beautiful and white ("think those are real?" whispers Clara), his hair has some kind of product in it making it look lustrous, and he's wearing jewels and gold on rings and fine clothes. He thanks the characters profusely and introduces himself as Aindriú. He calls for the last two wagons to be made into transports for the adventurers, for anyone else who's wounded to be given healing potions, and the characters notice that he treats his people kindly and respectfully - but that he clearly employs them.

Aisling wakes up the bandit captain and they briefly parlay, but the bandit doesn't have anything that they want and now that his company is scattered, he pledges to leave the caravan alone and rethink his life choices. They untie him and he and his fellows flee into the hills, and the caravan gets underway again! 

The characters ride in Aindriú's carriage at first; he has one of his people bring tea ("unless you'd like something stronger?" "Yes, please," says Fearg) and some dates that turn out to be covered in sugar ("I love these," he says). The characters chat, and Aindriú is pleasant and forthcoming. He correctly guesses all of their origins, listens sympathetically when they tell him they recently lost one of their company, and once again thanks them for their heroism. 

Aisling asks after his money; for the most part he just says he's "been fortunate." When she presses, he says he was a merchant in Fiadh and that he managed to sell a particular kind of wood that became very profitable for a short time. Aisling asks if he has any, and mentions that where she's from, such fine woods are used to make instruments, and Aindriú neatly changes the subject and gets her talking about her harp-lute. None of the characters see anything wrong with this story - Aindriú is charming and seems trustworthy, but Aisling suspects something. Not that he's lying, but he just seems to be leaving something out.

Aindriú tells them that he had a sister - Ailís - who was an adventurer. She left Fiadh to answer that call, but some years later a messenger from a village in central-western Abaile arrived in Fiadh delivering a box of her personal effects; she'd been slain defending the village. Aindriú neglected to get precise directions on where that village was, and he's been searching for it to find his sister's grave. He shows them a map of Abhaile and the places he's been, and points to the general area the village should be - on the shore of a small river, not so far west that the plains give way to the badlands, but he hasn't been able to find it. He searches for a while, then circumstances tend to draw him east or south, so he travels with his caravan, and eventually heads back to Cian for resupply (which is where he's going now).

The caravan stops for the night, circles their wagons, and hunters return with deer to roast. Aisling calls her companions together and voices her suspicions - where does Aindriú get so much gold? Why is he so free with it? And more importantly, why does he change the subject when asked about it? The others, thinking about it, share the concern, though Fearg gently points out that there are a number of stories in which suspicion is rewarded with tragedy. Aisling counters, though, that it's her being suspicious, and Fearg agrees that that in itself makes this strange.

Aindriú asks Aisling to play, which of course she does, and after a few songs on the harp-lute she switches to the bodhrán. Members of the caravan with instruments join in, people dance, and a good time is had. Dara sneaks off and turns into a squirrel, and listens in to conversations, looking to see how people talk about Aindriú. She doesn't find anything untoward - one person says to another that he's trying to work up the courage to ask Aindriú to help him buy something, evidently a gift for a lady-love, and the feeling is that he'd probably help if asked. 

That night, though, as everyone sleeps, Dara listens at Aindriú's carriage and hears him talking to someone - someone with a deep, echoey voice. She can't make out what this second voice says, but she hears Aindriú's response: "I'll use it when I have something worth using it on." Aindriú leaves his carriage and walks a bit, apparently troubled, and Dara scampers in to have a look. She finds...no one. The only thing different than when she was in here before is a small box, clearly old, encrusted with jewels. 

Next morning, Dara tells the others what she saw. Possessed box? Something in the box? They aren't sure. Aisling says that she wants to stop by the burned manor on the way into Cian (mostly as an excuse to break away from the caravan for a moment), and Fearg and Dara decide to join her. Clara, Keenan, and Zook stay with the caravan as it rolls into Cian. Aindriú, of course, graciously provides breakfast (Clara: "I really hope these people aren't evil, the food is so good"), and then the party splits. 

(They also level up, but that's incidental.)

Movie #968: The Innocents

The Innocents is a psychological (or supernatural, or both) horror movie based on The Turn of the Screw by Henry James and starring Deborah Kerr, Megs Jenkins, Pamela Franklin, Martin Stephens, Michael Redgrave, Peter Wyngarde, and Clytie Jessop. 

Miss Giddens (Kerr) is hired by a happy bachelor (Redgrave) to take charge of his orphaned niece Flora (Franklin) and nephew Miles (Stephens). "Take charge" may be underselling it; he flat-out says that no matter what happens, she's in charge and he wants to bounce around the world and bang hot twinks (this last bit is not explicitly stated) and wants nothing to do with any of them. 

So Giddens goes out to his country estate, a house far too big for the few people who live there, and meets Flora and Mrs. Grose (Jenkins), the head housekeeper. Not long after, Miles gets home from school after having been expelled, but won't say why (and this is in the days when a school could just boot a kid with no good explanation). 

Giddens begins to see people haunting the house and determines that they're the ghosts of her predecessor Miss Jessel (Jessop) and the valet, Quint (Wyndgarde). She comes to believe that the children are possessed by these people (which would be plenty weird enough, but they were lovers in life), and she fixates and getting them to admit what's happening. That winds up traumatizing Flora, and when left alone in the house with Miles, Giddens forces him to confront Quint's ghost...and he dies. 

There are a couple of interpretations here. One is that there really are ghosts and Giddens is trying to save the children. The other is that she's a few toes short of a toaster and winds up killing one kid and traumatizing the other. We never know one way or the other. The original script by William Archibald played up the supernatural more overtly, Truman Capote did some rewrites that amped up the psychologist thriller aspects, but I understand that James' original story doesn't fully explain it, either.

Ambiguous ghosts aside, though, the movie is really tense and well done. Deborah Kerr gives a fantastic performance as the naive and inexperienced governess put in a truly weird situation that just keeps getting weirder - these children are odd ducks. Flora needs constant attention, Miles speaks like a much older person and seems to be actively flirting with Giddens at times. The one you really feel for is Mrs. Grose, who loves the kids and is just trying to do her job amidst all of this shit that she is truly not prepared for. 

It's a sad and Gothic movie, it's beautifully shot, and (sing it with me) the house feels familiar by the end of it, but also manages to feel consistently too big for the people in it. It's not exactly a "fun" movie, but it's definitely a good example of how to do horror without gore or jump scares.

My Grade: A-
Rewatch Value: Low

Next up: John Dies at the End, presuming I don't get something from Toasty today

Character Creation: Legend of Ghost Mountain

WhoooOOOooooo a mouunnntaaaaaiiinn

The Game: Legend of Ghost Mountain
The Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group
Degree of Familiarity: Never played this, but I know SWADE pretty well
Books Required: Legend of Ghost Mountain and SWADE

Obviously inspired by wuxia fiction, Legend of Ghost Mountain has the players taking on the roles of Ghost Wardens. Basically they're people who became enforcers of the titular mountain, going out into the Empire and beating up ghosts so that they fly back to the mountain and get through the Hell Gate and get on with the business of being tortured until their souls are "lightened" enough that they can be reincarnated. (Which sounds horrific, but on the other hand, a lot of Western mythologies just have you getting tortured forever, full stop, so this is probably better.)

It looks pretty cool, actually. One thing I'm a little iffy about is that PCs start at Veteran, and I get why they're doing that - Wardens are supposed to be on the badass side. On the other hand, doesn't that kinda mean there's nowhere to go? Maybe it would have been better to just scale things so starting characters have the correct amount of badassery. But I haven't read the GM portion of the book, so I freely admit I'm talking out of my Hell Gate here. 

The book says that Ghost Wardens tend to be haunted (in the figurative sense), so I need some trauma in my past, here. Let's say my character is from the North and his village was wiped out by a clan of Horse Lords. The survivors fell back to the city of Sanctuary, and one day my character (let's name him Sky-Eyes Bo) saw a band of Ghost Wardens headed back to where his village was. He stole a horse and followed them, and had to watch them put to rest people that he'd known all his young life. "Put to rest" here sometimes meant helping them achieve whatever they were holding onto, but mostly it meant beating the ectoplasm out of them.

Sky-Eyes went back to Ghost Mountain with the Wardens and worked his way up from there. He was probably allowed to go because he knows about horses, but whatever works.

Cool, that'll work. Let's do chargen proper! My Race is human, obviously (I mean, I could be some kind of devil, but I don't wanna). The SWADE book actually says to do Hindrances next, so cool, we'll do that. 

Well, I'm gonna say that Sky-Eyes has a habit of gazing off into the distance. We'll just call that a Quirk. And I think I'll go ahead and lean in to his backstory and take Wronged as a Major Hindrance (it's basically Vengeful on steroids), and say he's out to get the Horse Lords. That's...there's a lot of them. Finally, since I'm from the North I need land, lots of land, and the starry skies above, so I'll take Claustrophobia (Minor).

Now we do Traits. Well, I'm going to get a bunch of advances, but I think I want to start playing to my strengths, so I'll put Agility to d8, Strength at d4, the others at d6.

Skillz! I get the usual starting skills (Notice, Common Knowledge, Persuasion, Athletics, Stealth) at d4, then 12 more. Obviously I want Fighting, but I want to do thrown weapons, too, so I'll jack Athletics to d8, Fighting to d8, Riding to d8, Survival to d6, and Thievery to d6.

Derived traits, whatever, I'll do those at the end. Edges! I have to take Ghost Warden. Now, do I get that free or do I have to take it? Just says it's required, so I guess it eats my free Edge. Grr. That means I need Martial Artist as well. Oh, but I can take these things with Advances, my guy didn't start as a Ghost Warden. OK, well, then I'll take Beast Bond as my free Edge. And then I get my four "points." I'll buy Occult d4, I'll put Spirit up to d8, and I'll put Notice up to d6.

Neato. And now we get to do Advances. Helpfully, there's slots on the character sheet, so I can keep this straight pretty easily.  

OK, I get three Advances under Novice. I will bump Agility to d10, buy Martial Artist, and bump Fighting and Athletics to d10.

Four Advances under Seasoned, and that would put me to Veteran, so I guess just those four. Well, obviously I need the Ghost Warden Edge, so that's first. I'll take the Throwing Mastery Edge so I can whip knives at ghosts. I'll bump Occult and Stealth to d6. And then...hmm. I feel like I should take my Attribute bump. Yeah, I'll knock Spirit up to d8.

And then I could spend money if I wanted, but I don't. Sky-Eyes Bo carries lots of little throwing knives and chakram, and is used to riding in to battle, hurling stuff at foes, and then riding off before they get their bears. 

Sky-Eyes is small and wiry, like a jockey. He's got the long white hair (used to be black, but turned white when he became a Warden) done up in a braid that's common in the North, and his eyes are brown with perhaps a greenish hue at times? He's adopted the dress of the Ghost Wardens, but he has a pair of rabbit-fur gloves that he's patched and rebuilt many times since he was a boy. 

That'll do it! 

Pugmire: Dreams & Nightmares

Hey, ho, awoo! Here's last time.

Our heroes awaken - well, "come to" might be closer to the truth, as they're asleep - in a dungeon. They are all manacled to the wall, along with Princess Yosha Pug and her father, King Puckington Pug! Gelert Sausagedog immediately gets to work picking the lock on his manacle, but then four guards rush in, unshackle Puckington, and drag him out! The dogs notice that all of the guards wear the livery of the Doberman family. 

Petunia Pibble casts beast mode and turns into a mouse, and then scampers toward the guards outside their cell door. Dire Newfoundland summons up his might and pulls the loop holding his manacle chain out of the wall, though his paws are still chained together. Peppa Papillon tries to wriggle free, but can't, so she just casts spiritual weapon and blesses a few of the others until someone gets around to freeing her. Hobbes von Shadow uses his slidey, liquidy cat-bones to slip out of his bonds. In the midst of all this, both Peppa and Petunia notice that their magic is much harder to cast, like its draining their power much faster than usual. 

Petunia uses magic paw to swipe the keys, but the guards notice, of course. Hobbes slips through the bars on the cell door, grabs the keys, and unlocks it, and then frees Dire. Dire, in turn, grabs the keys and lets Yosha and Peppa down (Sausagedog has, by now, freed himself), and then rushes to battle! 

Petunia casts a slick under both guards and they collapse, and the battle is joined - they manage to stand and then swipe with cudgels. Hobbes pummels a guard and Dire rushes in to swing his hammer (why do the dogs have their weapons? Dream logic). The other dogs leave the cell, and they notice Yosha trying to cast magic but the power fizzling at her paws. And then more guards rush in from another hallway, grab the princess, and take her away!

Peppa yells "The princess!" and follows, and Sausagedog joins. Hobbes continues laying a cat-style martial arts smackdown on the guards, and Dire swings his hammer about, occasionally tanking a blow. The guards, for their part, always manage to slip and fall in the oil, and at one point Petunia tries to strike a prone guard with her staff. She tries, but is too tentative (hitting a helpless opponent isn't really what she's good at; meanwhile Hobbes cheerfully kicks a guard in the ribs until he dies). The guard grabs her staff and takes it away!

Petunia looks around for a rock to throw at him and suddenly, she has one in her hand! Realizing she can influence the dream by thinking about it, she tries to get her staff back, but that backfires. The guard stands, eyes glowing, and bellows "THE POWER!" and unleashes a cloud of seeking stingers at the characters.

Petunia tries to tackle him, but he sidesteps her. That doesn't help him when Hobbes kicks him in the back of the head, and the dogs win the fight and rush off after their friends!

Meanwhile, Peppa and Sausagedog arrive in a crowded castle foyer. They see a second floor, but they're more interested in the stage in front of them. Heinrich Doberman marches up and down, dressed in robes and wearing the Crown of Pugmire! Yosha is in stocks on the stage, her little head thrust forward, and Heinrich raises his sword to behead her! 

Peppa sends her conjured weapon across the room and smacks Heinrich, distracted him, while Sausagedog looks up hoping for a chandelier - and finds one! He swings across the room and lands in front of Heinrich, knocking the crown off his head, and the two engage in a swordfight.

Peppa calls up the strike of Man, one of her most powerful spells, and sends fire and holy light down on Heinrich. And then Peppa explodes. 

The other three dogs arrive about now, just as the crowd is starting to get really ugly. "Kill the Pug!" they scream. Sausagedog tosses the crown into the crowd ("First one who gets it is the new king!") but that tactic doesn't take; these dogs are apparently loyal to Heinrich. He does manage to free Yosha, and Petunia casts arcane lasso and hurls Dire over the crowed into the upstairs...and then explodes! 

Hobbes and Sausagedog make their way up as well, with Heinrich and the rest of his loyalists in hot pursuit. They check the doors - one's a broom closet, one's a silver closet, one seems to be Heinrich's room - but the last one they check shows them their goal! A huge egg is tucked into a small bed at the far end of the room, but standing in the way is a nightmare version of Viveka Doberman!

Her eyes drip purple, crackling magic, and her claws are long and blackened. The characters charge into the room, and she points a hand at Dire. Black magic flows out and strikes him, and he vanishes, leaving only his floofs behind. Hobbes dodges past Viveka - Sausagedog tries, but falls to her magic as well - and Hobbes leaps and lands on the egg, smashing it!

Back in the waking world, Hobbes wakes ("ugh, my fur!") to find everyone else already awake and staring at him and Yosha. Yosha raises a paw and calls up light ("oh, thank Man for that!") and then runs out to help Ruby and Boomer and all fight the demons outside.

"Hmm," says Not Even. "Guess if you die in the dream you don't die in real life. Good to know." He looks at Bivi and Marshmallow. "Who next?"

The characters choose Bivi, assume their positions on the cushions, and Not Even sends them under again....

The come to in a warehouse, stacked floor to ceiling with crates and boxes, stretching on for what seems like miles. But they realize they're all old. Petunia leans heavily on her staff, Sausagedog's back is crooked, Hobbes' tuxedo coloring has gone almost all white, Peppa is grey around the snoot and milky-eyed, and Dire's floof has lost some of its luster. Bivi, for his part, is even older, and stares at the markings on a box. "We found this," he says, "in the Fearful Forest. It was many years ago, and there was...oh...I used to know."

The dogs listen carefully and realize that something - or a lot of somethings - is pounding on the walls to this place. They might be on a clock, here.

They think about the organization of this place. The artifacts don't seem to be categorized, but newer stuff is added later, so older stuff would be in the middle. But where would the egg be? They found out about those recently, so that would seem to indicate the edges, but then Dire points out that they're all old now, so maybe in the logic of the dream that happened a long time ago? 

They ask Bivi, but he's no help, he can't stay focused. They talk to him a bit and he mentions something about a safe - that's where the really dangerous stuff would be. Sausagedog realizes that a safe would have been built first - the middle, then.

They head off down a hallway (and Bivi tries to wander away, but they steer him back). They find the center of the warehouse, and lo, a floor safe with a combination lock. Sausagedog patiently talks to Bivi about what the combination might be, and he remembers - the date that Pioneer Storehouse in Riverwall was complete! Sausagedog, a very well-read dog, knows this date. They open the safe, expecting an egg...but a serpent slithers out! 

It tries to get away, but Dire is too fast and casts a sacred flame on it. It bursts into fire and sizzles, turning over and dying, and all of the dogs wake up.

"That was easy," says Dire. "Ugh, being old sucks," mutters Hobbes. Bivi gives him a look. 

"Right, one more," says Not Even, looking at Marshmallow von Mau. 

This time, they wake up in Riverwall - but they are all cats! Marshmallow and Hobbes look about the same. Sausagedogcat is a slim little tabby, while Peppa is a pure white kittenish sort of moggie. Dire is a huge ragdoll, and Petunia has become a calico. They look at each other in surprise a bit, and then realize that the world seems...off. The sky is crooked. The buildings are at weird angles. Is this what being a cat is like? 

They also notice that the city is full of dogs, but the dogs are all...similar. Not identical, but just brown, generic dogs, nearly faceless. But they stare at the cats, and mothers clutch their pups closer. "Don't like that," growls Dire. "Yeah," says Marshmallow. "Gets old."

They ask Marshmallow where the snake is, and he concentrates and then says "Dog Castle!" It's in the Palace District. They realize that breaking in isn't going to work, so they'll need some distraction. Petunia goes into a butcher shop and a big, beefy pit bull stares her down. "Yeah?"

"I would like some bones!" she says cheerfully. "All you can sell me."

The dog grunts. "Let's see your plastic."

Petunia cocks her head. "You know, you look like my mother's cousin's sister's-"

The dog scoffs. "Bet I don't." 

Petunia remembers that she's a cat. Cowed, she hands over her plastic and buys the bones he'll give her. She is overcharged and underserved, but that's life for a cat in Pugmire. 

Meanwhile, Sausagedog thinks about where one might find a tunnel into the castle, and comes up with an idea. They find an entrance from the War that leads into a storeroom - a dog is rustling around in there. They toss a bone and lure him over, and Dire casts command on him: "Play dead!" They tie him up and sneak up to the kitchen.

The cats pad quietly through the kitchen, use magic and bones to make dogs look the other way, and manage to sneak upstairs into the castle. As they're looking about and trying to sniff out the evil, Sausagedog, unused to this tiny cat-snoot, sneezes, and the conversation in other rooms halts. He tries to sound dog-like ("boy, it's dusty in here!") but the guards recognize his cat accent (cat-cent? Also Sausagedog's player could not make a roll for love nor money). The guards come pouring out of rooms, and the cats run towards where they smelt the evil!

They wind up in a trophy room, full of treasures stolen from the Monarchies. The guards hot on their heels, Dire calls for Hobbes to help him brace the door. At the other end of the room, they see a brass statue of a huge serpent - that's it!

Petunia fires an elemental beam at it, hoping it'll just melt, but it bursts and a kind of not-quite-Nagayaga stands there! It's still got legs, but its torso is too long for its body and its arms are big and noodly. It charges at them, and Peppa calls down a strike of man. The monster howls in pain and tries to bite at Sausagedog (who runs out to meet it), but Peppa grits her teeth, casts the spell again, and the monster vanishes in holy fire.

The cats awaken - dogs again! (Mostly, not Hobbes or Marshmallow, obviously.) Ruby Labrador enters, wiping off her mace. "You OK in here?"

They groggily nod. "Need help?"

"Nah," she says. "Really Boomer did a lot of the work. Just ripped through them like a murder tornado."

"Yeah, he does that."

The characters have one final dream to invade, though: Viveka Doberman. Not Even lays out the problems for them. "She's not going to cooperate, meaning we need a way to keep her asleep."

"So we'll need to drug her."

"Yes. Also I need to be able to see all of you, so you'll need to be in close proximity." He pauses. "There's something else, too. You didn't die in these dreams when you 'died', but the people having the dreams were friends and allies. Viveka is neither, plus she's a powerful artisan. She might be able to hold your souls there when if you 'die' in her dream, and I don't know what she could do with them."

The dogs nod. This is going to be a difficult fight, and before they even get to that point, they need to figure out how to get near her.

"Do the Dobermans have parties?" wonders Sausagedog. "Like, big fancy ones?"

Yosha shrugs. "They do, but I'm never invited. And I wouldn't go anyway. They only invite friends and political allies."

"Amazed they still have any," growls Dire. 

"They've lost much of their overt support," says Yosha, "but there are still families that wouldn't mind seeing them take the throne, or want their support for their own bids." 

"Anyway," says Sausagedog, "they'd probably need caterers. Servants, that kind of thing." 

"No way would they let cats in," says Marshmallow. 

"No," says Sausagedog, warming up, "but we can use disguises!"

"Good," says Not Even. "You've got a long trip home, figure it out, I'll see you there."

Next time: Into the Dreams of Doberman! or, The Dream-Snake Job, or, The Grand Finale!

Character Creation: Cerebos: The Crystal City

I don't...think someone snuck mescaline into my coffee today.

The Game: Cerebos: The Crystal City
The Publisher: Penguin King Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

I really like the premise of this game. It's surreal, it's got at least a toe in magical realism, and it's about self-actualization as depicted by resolving touchstones. It also does a couple of things that are pretty original: your character has a goal determined by another player and you don't know it right away, and after the first leg of the journey (everyone's on a train, that's a constant in the game, though the form of the train and the conductor are up for grabs) one player becomes the "Seeker" and the others become "Saints" (trying to help them reach their goal) and "Demons" (trying to prevent them). 

Yes, that effectively means there's a "main character," but y'know? For a game like there that's only going to go two or three sessions, I don't think that's a bad thing. 

Now, there are a few things I'm not crazy about, and they most cook down to this game not being terribly accessible. It starts off with a comic that is complete gobbledygook if you haven't read the book already, and the language in the game itself is...not by any means incomprehensible, but it's one of those games that I feel would have benefited from some straight, clear, unobfuscated explanation of what the hell is actually going on. 

But would that have fucked with the tone too much? I think it's perfectly playable, though it would require a closer reading (and I'm not thrilled with how small the text is in the printed version). It would really require the right table, but most of the best games do. I dunno. It's one of those games that I wish I could reach across time and assemble a group picked from the people I've played with over the years. Maybe we could play it on a train, to make it really meta!

Anyway, let's make a character. This is a pretty quick process, which is good, because I want to play more Zero Company. Actually, it's a two-step process: Pick three touchstones, pick a name, fuckin' done. (Were I actually playing this game, there would be more, because as a group we'd decide on the conductor and another player would give me a goal.)

As I'm thinking about concepts, I'm finding myself interested in the idea of person or animal that is part of an endeavor, but has not concept of what that endeavor is, or indeed that they're even in it. Think of the horse wearing blinders or the sled dog in the middle of the team, or, hell, to get a little weirder with it, the pace car in a race. I don't think I want to actually be a car (or a horse, for that matter), so let's say that my character is a man, probably in his 40s, curly hair that's greying at the temples and dark skin. 

Touchstones can be just about anything, and they're attached to Traits, which are pretty open-ended. They can be skills or memories or just aspects of the character. There's a table of random touchstones; I might dip into that, but I want to bring across the concepts I'm thinking about. So I'll say my guy has a pair of very dark sunglasses (Trait: Patience) and an empty bottle of sunscreen (Trait: Lived in an island paradise).

For the last one...you know, instead of rolling on the table in the book, I'll roll on a table in The Weird. Rolled 08...ooh, one of the options is "mobile phone loaded up with cursed videos." We don't have to read "cursed" as literally, supernaturally cursed, it could just be the more internet-y definition of the word. I think the phone is clearly not his - like, it's pink and blinged out. Since Traits really run the gamut (some of the ones in the Cerebos book include "The Dead Do Not Feel Pain," "Intermediate Geomancy," and "Big Enough") I'm going to call this one "Hold This a Minute."

All I need now is a name or a title. Let's call my guy "the Constant." (That's not a Hitman reference, it's closer to the idea of a mathematical constant.)

And that's me done!

Movie #967: Alvin & The Chipmunks

Alvin & The Chipmunks is kids movie based on the old cartoons and "band" of the same name, and stars Jason Lee, David Cross, Cameron Richardson, and the voices of Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler, and Jesse McCartney. It's pretty awful.

Dave Seville (Lee) is an marketing dude and struggling songwriter who pitches songs to his old college buddy Ian (Cross), now the head of Jett Records. He gets rejected after pitching a song that sounds a lot like Death Cab for Cutie's "I Will Follow You Into the Dark" with every bit of sentiment stripped out, but on the way out of the building picks up three stowaways: Alvin (Long), Simon (Gubler), and Theodore (McCartney), three CGI chipmunks that were in a tree that the company cut down for its Xmas display. 

These chipmunks can not only talk and reason like people, but can sing more-or-less contemporary songs in three-part harmony, so like, that's weird.

Anyway, they reveal themselves to Dave, he's all set to kick them out after they utterly trash his house until he realizes they can sing, so he writes a new, fresh Christmas song...oh, wait, it's the god-awful "Chipmunk Christmas Song" that came out fifty goddamn years before this movie? Oh, OK. Anyway, after a false start where the Chipmunks freeze up, they become worldwide sensations, Ian manipulates them with the rock-n-roll lifestyle to move out of Dave's house, but eventually Dave admits he wants a family and they're all back together and Ian is left trying to get real squirrels to sing. 

Well, I can't say I was expecting to enjoy this movie, but I used to watch the cartoon when I was a kid, so maybe some nostalgia? Nah. It plays just like someone - by which I mean a committee and a focus group - wrote it today in a boardroom, with two awkwardly old songs (the Xmas one and "Witch Doctor") remixed and crammed in. 

Jason Lee is completely unlikeable as Dave. I don't know if it's because he can't act when working with CGI (and I could understand that), but he really comes across as bland and boring no matter what scene he's in. David Cross is a little more watchable, but he's also more shameless and doesn't mind literally shaking his ass in this movie. 

And then there's the Chipmunks. I don't know if I'm just getting old, but man, I have no interest in watching CGI creatures hop around and fart. If the jokes were better, if the movie had any heart, maybe it wouldn't bother me, but as it is, I felt trapped between Chipmunks whose voice performances aren't great because they're sped or pitched up (and I cannot understand them when they sing) and human performances for people who were very clearly standing there thinking "big paycheck, big paycheck, lots of actors can't even find work, c'mon, you can do it." 

My kids would have been about the right age to enjoy this movie when they were smol (it came out in 2007, so not in theaters, but certainly in the home video market) and I'm glad it never made it into rotation. 

My Grade: D-
Rewatch Value: IINSIAIFWT

Next up: Near Dark

Character Creation: Nebula Chaos

It's called "space opera," but you never hear a fat lady sing. 

The Game: Nebula Chaos
The Publisher: Polyhedra
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

So, this is nothing really special - it's a space opera game that is heavily, heavily inspired by Star Wars (the title is even kind of synonymous), but also drawing on other properties in the genre. It was made for about $2600 on Kickstarter, there are only six updates on the campaign, and you know, it's very clearly made with some heart.

Some jank, too, and I'm not crazy about this:

Like, if you can't say "shit" then don't half-ass it and type in this stupid Youtube-thumbnail-ese (only slightly better than the Tiktokese dialect of internet speech, which gives us shit like "seggs". Yes, I am old). But minor complaints about writing style aside, the game looks perfectly playable. Let's make a chaotic nebula or whatever!

A bookmarked PDF, did I just win the fuckin' lottery? 

OK, so we start off by assigning base stats. Said stats are Power, Dexterity, Personality, Intelligence, and Will. What's average? Well, an "easy" difficulty is 8, so a point or two in a given stat is probably enough to be considered average. What kind of spacey person would I like to make? 

There are a bunch of different species of alien, but unlike many RPGs that use alien (and fantasy) races, any given members of a race don't necessarily have the same characteristics. That is, a bot might have Exoskeletal Structure, but not necessarily. I'm not sure if that holds up in play, but I like the idea. I think I want my guy to be an Extratareptile, because I think that's lots of fun to say. The book says they are cold-blooded and warm-hearted (I am reminded of Sissix in The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet). 

Let's say my Extratareptile is a face, but kind of fussy and uptight, rather like C-3PO. I picture him as having very long, delicate fingers with pointy (but not especially sharp) nails, and a kind of iguana-like face. Let's name him Fullim (/fulIm/, though there are some aspirant sounds that exist in his language that other species find hard to say, or even hear). 

Right, so, Fullim's stats. Obviously Personality needs to be high, as does Intelligence. I'll put both of those at 4, leaving 12 points for the other 4 stats. 3 in each? Nah, let's leave Power at 2 and jack Intelligence to 5. 

Sub-stats! HP is 12, EP is equal to Will, so 3. Speed is 25ft. 

Ability points! I get 10 of these. One of the recommended ones for my species is Infrared Vision, which I kind of like, so I'll blow 3 AP on that. Oh, I can take Traits, which can give me points back, and I want the Annoying Trait. Like the expression of it - I roll a d3, and on a 1 I take a PRS penalty, which is about right. That gives me 2 back, so I'm still at 9. 

Well, let's take some Skills, then. Language is a good one, and since I'm a reptile, not a robot, I'll say that Fullim is actually multi-lingual rather than having some kind of translation power. Languages are 1 point each, so I'll spend 4, specify one of them as Thungrarian (the language of the Empire), and leave the rest blank, because in play it'd be smart to see what languages are needed and then say that he speaks it. 

I figure as a lizard, Climb makes sense, right? Oh, definitely need Diplomacy. Hang on, there are a bunch of social skills and I can't afford that many. OK, let's trim back two Language slots, and then take Diplomacy, Sense Motive, Con/Bluff, and Perception. 2 points remaining. Any other Abilities I want? Oh, shit, yeah, I want Sincerest Apologies! Once per session I can apologize and reroll a PRS check.

Items! Since these are arranged in Tiers, not money-cost, I'll go ahead and figure it out. I get 2 Tier 1, 2 Tier 2, 1 Tier 3, and 1 Personal. 

For my Tier 1s, I'll take a spacesuit (seems wise) and a lighter (making a fire is a good idea when you're cold blooded). For my Tier 2s, I'll take...ah, hell, these are mostly weapons. Well, let's say I get 2 Tier 3s instead? Nah, those are all weak, too. Well, I want a hoverpack, anyway.

I think that'll do it, actually. Fullim is green of scale, yellow eyes, tall and thin. He doesn't have a tail and he's a little annoyed that people keep asking (the creatures humans evolved from have tails, but no one ever asks them). 

Marvel: End of the Journey

Last night we ended our jaunt through superhero RPGs with a final session of Marvel Heroic Roleplaying via Cortex. Recall that we started way back here with Marvel Superheroes and then took a trip through Wearing the Cape. Here's last time.

Our heroes stumble back to the quinjet and regroup. Bucky is pretty dinged up; Magnus tosses him a pill from the Hat that helps his bones knit quickly and everyone takes a quick turn in the magical Faraday cage to shake off some of the dimensional influence that Wanda smacked on them. But they still have a dilemma: What to do about Wanda.

Maria points out that Wanda, during the limited time that she was able to observe her before she supposedly died, was never in the habit of possession and murder. Perhaps she, too, is being influenced by something? After all, all of them felt something talking to them before, and they saw that weird purple stuff around her eyes. Bucky, who of course knows a little something about mind control, agrees it's possible, and the four of them agree to take one shot at reaching her - one. It's too dangerous to do more than that.

They leave the jet and find Wanda standing there, waiting for them. Maria approaches her while the others fan out (but it's not like she doesn't know where they are). Maria talks to her, and she says that all she wants is Magnus to come with her into "the portal". Maria asks why, what she's trying to fix or heal, and Wanda say she's moved beyond that. There's no healing. Time doesn't heal wounds, time festers them, deepens them. Time, she says, is an insult.

Magnus, at this point, has had enough, and hurls a rune of stillness from the Hat, hoping to silence Wanda and/or prevent her from casting. She sees it coming, her headband flashes red, and the rune slows, stops, and falls. Spidey leaps up and fires webs at her, but she waves her hands and the webs dry up and turn to cobwebs before they get to her. 

At this point, Wanda mutters something under her breath in Sokovian. Magnus (who basically understands whatever language is being used) catches it: "Hit them." And then something does indeed hit them all, something moving far too fast to see. A man with white hair, wearing blue, skids to a halt next to Wanda. He opens his mouth and starts to speak ("You didn't see-"), but then disintegrates, his body collapsing in on itself. Bucky notices Wanda each out and touch his hand right before he does. 

Maria shakes off the blow and unfurls her whips, tangling Wanda up and shocking her. "Now, Spidey!"

Spider-Man webs up her hands. Her eyes glow red, but Magnus flings his Null-Dimensional Shroud out (muttering to it "if we can't fix her you can eat her soul"). It bites her and interrupts whatever spell she was casting. Maria pulls the whips and yells for Bucky for help, and the two of them push her into the jet and into the Faraday cage!

Wanda collapses, and then pulls herself back up, the purple gone from her eyes. She has a look of fear, though, and tells them that it's not her that they need to worry about. "He wants Magnus," she says. 

"Who?" someone asks, but then everything goes black.

The characters' vision clears, and they find themselves in something like a photo-negative representation of Mount Wundagore. The sky is black, and...plants? Something like plants? Blossom forth in fractals. They look around and try to get their bearings, and while he might not admit it, even Magnus hasn't been to a place like this before. He talks, however, about other dimensions, maybe hells, that he's seen...

And then a face appears in the air before them, vaguely masculine, but black and rippling. 

It asks Magnus if he ever starts talking. "Not often," he says, and the others agree. "Are you the god of this place?"

"I am Dormammu." 

"Yeah, sounds like a god-name." 

Dormammu explains that Magnus, like him, is a "singular being." "Like me, there is only one of you in the multiverse," he explains. "But unlike me, you destroy whatever reality you pass through. Your very presence unravels the basic rules of existence, wherever you go."

Magnus is uncharacteristically quiet. He didn't know this.

"But why would you care? The millions of lives you destroy are not even a notable fraction of the ones you'll never see. They are not important, yes?"

Magnus agrees...but hesitates. 

"So what do you want with him?" asks Maria. 

"I want him to stay here," Dormammu says. "I made a bargain that I wish to be revoked, and his presence will unravel it. That is all I require, for him to stay here." A pause. "Quietly, if possible." And the face vanishes.

The four of them look at each other, and then at Magnus. Magnus figures he could probably get out, but it would be hard - he describes it as swimming up from the bottom of the ocean. Doing it while taking them with him would be nearly impossible.

Bucky nods. "Then we need to stay," he says. Maria and Spidey agree - if the choice is they remain in the Dark Dimension but Magnus escapes, thwarting whatever it is that Dormammu wants, or else Magnus stays and Dormammu is released from his bargain, that seems an obvious, if painful, choice.

Magnus paces and curses to himself. "Empathy," he spits. "When did I start caring about people?"

He reaches into the Hat and pulls out a pouch, and tosses it on the ground. "Get in." Somehow, the three of them are able to crawl inside (is it bigger, or are they smaller?). He picks up the pouch and puts it back in the Hat, and then draws a circle on the ground and begins crafting a spell to escape. 

Dormammu appears. "You cannot-"

"Fuck you." Magnus calls up every bit of magic he has, and pushes at the edges of the Dark Dimension. He realizes that there's no time here, so no causality - nothing happens, everything happens, all at once, so there's no escape. But Magnus' very presence decays the rules, and it increments a few nanoseconds of time...and that's all he needs.

He reappears on Mount Wundagore and stumbles forward a few steps, and then collapses. The Hat rolls off his head, and a moment later a white rabbit hops out, dragging the pouch. It noses it open, and Spider-Man, Maria, and Bucky emerge (they see what looks like a building-sized rabbit, and then suddenly they're standing there and the rabbit is normal). "Um...good bunny." The rabbit wiggles its nose at them, and then hops back into the Hat.

They drag Magnus into the quinjet and put him on a bunk, and then let Wanda out. "You going to be OK?" 

Wanda shakes her head. "Probably not. Strange is dead?" They nod, and Wanda looks pained. She pulls the Eye of Agamotto out of her shirt. "I need to give this to Wong," she says. 

Maria nods to the mountain. "What about this?" 

"I'll break it before I go," she says. She pauses. "Dreykov forced me to kill my brother. After I destroyed the Red Room, I wound up getting pulled into the Dark Dimension. I was there...well, 'a long time' doesn't mean anything, but when you have subjective eons, you can get really skilled." She looks at the heroes. "I'm sorry. If you see Natasha and the others, please tell them I'm sorry for what I did to them."

She leaves the quinjet, and Maria takes off. As they fly away, in the distance, they see a red flash, and the mountain collapses on itself.

Maria flies the quinjet back to New York, where she starts hearing broadcasts questioning the Avengers and press statements from said Avengers trying to explain things. She lands at the compound, and Natasha meets her. The two of them talk, Maria says that she thinks they've progressed beyond Bucky being locked in a truck. "Yeah," says Natasha. "You'd better go talk to Steve, though."

"Yeah, great," mutters Bucky.

Spidey has already left. He's been gone too long, and needs to get back to his family.

Sometime later, Magnus wakes up. The rabbit emerges from the Hat, and hops up to his shoulder. "Good work, Fluffles," he says, and leaves this reality.

Magnus goes someplace with no conflict, no war, few people - there aren't many places like that, but there are some. He leaves a note for the others. "Thanks, hopefully I don't see you again." And then he sits, and ponders whether there's a next part of his journey.

FIN

Thrilling Adventures! Omen of the Gigantic Tiger, Pt. 2

Last night we completed our epic tale in Thrilling Adventures! Here's last time.

Our heroes head north on the train, and disembark near the city of Khabarovsk. Marigold goes onto the platform and buys a map (it's a little older, dating from the Great War, but she figures it's not like the mountains have moved). Moxie gets his motorcycle, Harley, off the train, and Ernie does the same for his truck (Martha). Robert sits in the passenger seat, staying warm. 

Ernie is talking with (what he assumes is) a railway employee. Ernie doesn't speak a lot of Russian, but he understands "truck" and "fee," so he's dealing with that, but glances back and sees the truck shift. Ernie is an experienced truck driver and has had to deal with folks trying to hitch rides surreptitiously, so he positions himself so he can see a little better. And indeed, it looks like someone just got out of the truck. He also glances down and sees that this "railway employee" has a pistol in his coat!

Robert hears the noise, as well, and slides open the panel to look in the back. And there he sees a couple of dudes pulling the kids (Rina and Timmy) out of the truck, hands over their mouths! Robert gets out of the car and yells a warning, and Marigold (with the better vantage point) sees the dudes heading for another vehicle. She draws her pistol and tries to shoot out the tires, but she can't get a clear shot, and the Russians pile into the truck with the kids and drive off!

Moxie, however, guns the engine on Harley, pulls up onto the platform (yelling "get on!" to Marigold), and takes off in pursuit. Ernie jumps in the truck along with Robert, and they join the chase!

Moxie pulls the bike up next to the driver's side of the villains' truck, and Marigold opens the door and yanks out the driver. She jumps in to take the wheel, but the thug in the passenger seat fights her! Meanwhile, Moxie drops back and slashes at the latch to the back door with his sword. The doors fly open to reveal Rina and Timmy tied up on the floor, and a bunch of angry dudes with guns! They fire at Moxie (and he swerves out of the way), as Robert and Ernie pull up behind them.

Robert tells Ernie to get closer, climbs onto the hood of Martha, and jumps to the back of the kidnappers' truck. He lands on the back, grabs the roof, but the door swings shut and smashes his wrist - he's uninjured, but his wrist-mounted dart gun is destroyed. In the cab, Marigold whangs the thug with the butt of her gun and knocks him out, but turns her attention back to the road to see a low-hanging branch in her path. No time to avoid it (especially not without endangering her comrades), so she just braces herself and the branch smashes the windshield.

Moxie swerves in and stabs one of the gun-toting Russians. He falls out of the truck, dropping his gun, which Robert catches. Letting the filters in his Z-ray goggles do the work, he shoots the other two thugs, neutralizing the last of the threats!

Marigold stops the truck, and searches through the glove box and the pockets of the unconscious guy in the passenger seat. She doesn't find anything, but his eyes snap open - one is blue, one is green (which she remembers matched the description Timmy gave of the "weird guy" that showed up at the dig after the Russians found the Tiger). The thug speaks in a voice clearly not his own, asking Marigold's name (which she does not give), and introducing himself as Alexei Grigoriovich Nefsky. She opens the door and calls the others up, but by the time anyone gets there the man is just drooling before slumping forward, dead. Marigold opens his eyes, which are now both brown. 

The team unties the kids and catches their breath, and then Ernie pushes the Russians' truck off the road and everyone continues along. They arrive at the dig site and climb up a hill, where Marigold uses her spyglass to get a lay of the land. There are a lot of Russians here, all with guns, and lot of them wearing tatty Russian Army uniforms. Timmy points out the entrance to the caverns where the Tiger waits, and also notes a dude marching up and down in a black uniform, barking orders - Ivan. 

The team takes a break and waits until dark. Moxie patches up his wounds, Robert finishes his rail gun and moves it to the hilltop, and Ernie and Marigold find a watchtower and take out the guy on watch. They spend time peering through the spyglass and investigating. Marigold realizes that the uniforms these guys are wearing match up with a "lost regiment" of Tsarist Russian soldiers that disappeared during the Revolution. 

But as they're searching, Marigold swings her spyglass over and sees another guard peering through his spyglass straight at her! He fires a flare gun ("oops"), and the Russians mobilize! They start charging up the hill, and Robert looks over to Timmy. "Bring those railroad spikes!"

He fires the rail gun, taking out groups of the soldiers and laughing maniacally, and then turns the gun on a shack with some Russian lettering on the side. Ernie can read that it says "MUNITITIONS" but is too far away to tell Robert (and it probably wouldn't have made much difference anyway). The shack explodes in a fireball, illuminating the dig, and chaos reigns. Ernie uses a wrench to zipline into the camp, probably intending to drop down and cause a diversion so Marigold can get to the cavern, but misjudges the angle and gets stuck hanging above the camp. 

Multiple Russians point guns at him, and things look bleak for Ernie...but then Moxie zooms in on his bike and breaks the line! "Drop down!" he yells, and Ernie does ("OOF"), and Moxie takes off...but then a slim, disheveled man steps in front of the bike and waves his hand. Moxie hits something and the bike goes flying, and Ernie and Moxie slide into the snow. 

Meanwhile, Marigold looks up and sees a group of Russians advancing on Robert and the kids. She gives up her stealth to warn them, firing her gun in the air, and Robert turns around and sees thugs approaching. He gives his maniacal laugh again and kicks the now-spent rail gun, and it explodes, taking out the Russians and blowing him, Rina, and Timmy over the edge and down the hill! But now all of them are at barrel's end.

They are stripped of weapons and put in a cage, and Ivan struts up and down, monologueing in Russian (Robert: "I hate to miss a good monologue." Rina: "Is not that good"). He steps aside and the strange man - Alexei - steps up. He stares at Timmy and demands the key to the Tiger, and his men point guns at the team menacingly. Timmy, terrified, tosses the key to him...

"The hell with this," mutters Ernie, and kicks the cage as hard as he can. The cage wall snaps forward and falls! Moxie leaps forward and starts throwing punches, knocking out Russians, and a whole group of them mob him! "Get the key!" he yells.

Robert does just that - rushes forward and snatches the key from Alexei's grasp, and then grabs the kids and runs for the caverns. Ernie tackles Alexi and pushes him back against a shack wall, and Alexi stares him down...

...and suddenly Ernie is remembering a pie-eating contest he won in his hometown, years ago, sitting there feeling very full, covered in blueberries, holding a trophy. In the present, he just smiles ("blueberry...") and does not notice as Alexi pulls a gun and aims at his head!

Moxie notices, however! He leaps in front of Ernie and takes the bullet for him, and collapses into the snow. Ernie snaps out of it, and Alexi picks up a handful of snow and tosses it up, creating a little localized blizzard! It doesn't last long, just long enough for Alexei to disappear.

Marigold, meantime, engages Ivan, but quickly finds out he's dangerous. He slashes her across the cheek with his knife, and they trade blows, but then Ernie steps in front of Marigold and Ivan stabs him in the shoulder...but he doesn't flinch. Marigold peeks around and holds him at gunpoint, yelling to the other Russians to back off or Ivan gets it!

In the caverns, Timmy, Rina, and Robert find the Tiger - a huge, majestic, clockwork beast. Robert is immediately taken with it, and takes the key up to the slot ("on the neck," says Timmy). As he gazes at it, figuring out the mechanism, he hears a voice: "Do it."

He looks down and sees Alexei, a hand on either kid's shoulder. "Do it. Use the key. Activate the Tiger." Timmy shakes his head and mouths "DON'T DO IT" to Robert, and Robert, perhaps uncharacteristically, listens. 

"I want to," he says, "but I don't think I will." 

Alexei sneers, and then takes one step...and is atop the Tiger with Robert! He stares Robert down, attempting to mesmerize him as he did Ernie...

....but we flash back to Robert working on his Z-Ray goggles and his no-good brother Henry standing behind him, telling him that the physics are impossible, the idea is stupid, he'll never...

"SUCK IT, HENRY!" yells Robert in the present, and shoots at Alexi, just as Marigold and Ernie (helping a now-bandaged Moxie) arrive. Alexi reels from the shot, and Marigold follows it up with a shot from her pistol! Alexi falls from the Tiger, dead.

Cut to the exterior and a rumbling from the cavern, and then the entrance explodes outward as the heroes, riding the Tiger, spring into the camp! The remaining Russians run, and the team revels in victory!

And now the final shot, the team back on the train. Ernie and Moxie share a drink and relax. Robert is going over plans on what to do with the Tiger and how to replicate it - screw the Model T. Marigold is teaching Timmy and Rina to play blackjack.

And in the cargo car, a disassembled Tiger's eyes begin to glow softly...

FIN...?