Character Creation: Over War: The Night Comes Down

The title makes me think of the line from MacBeth ("let it come down," which coincidentally was the title of a really bad one-act play I wrote in college) or the song from Labyrinth ("As the World Falls Down"). Neither of these things are remotely applicable to this game.

The Game: Over War: The Night Comes Down
The Publisher: Blackoath Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Over War: The Night Comes Down is a fantasy RPG with about five pages of setting info and then into the game stuff! It sets up the world of Ballark. There are a bunch of sentient peoples, some various kingdoms and fiefdoms and so on, and then the folks from the Over Night swoop down and invade. You're playing a Commander and as part of that you draft a Unit of soldiers of various sorts, and then do tactical shit. It's very war-gamey, and that's fine; probably isn't something I'd run, but I didn't hate it, either. (I do hate that the pagination in the book is off, but the PDF is bookmarked, so we'll call that a wash). 

First thing I do in creating my Commander is to pick an Authority Tag, and here we get into a slight problem. The book tells us that tags are innate properties and signifiers for the game world, OK. We're also told there's more info on p. 23. There's not. Rather, there is in the PDF, but the pagination is different in the print copy, which is something I've seen not infrequently in indie RPGs with POD games. 

Anyway, our first tag is less about Authority and more about species. I'm not feeling especially adventurous today, so I'll say my guy is Human. Oh, wait, hang on, I get it. I get Authority as a tag. That is not clear at first read, at least not without a cup of coffee. One really should have been included with the book. 

Ahem. Anyway, next we choose a history. I think I'll roll 4d6 and do it off this handy table. "Provincial Soldier." Cool, I'm like William Wallace, kind of. And why do my soldiers follow me? (2d6...9) "Generous Rewards!" These...two things seem at odds. Actually, the wording of Generous Rewards just says I know how to secure resources, not that I have them myself, so that's fine. 

Oh, I've got an idea. My guy was a thief and a swindler, got caught, and chose to join the military rather than hang (not normally an option, but, like, war). He won the loyalty of his fellow soldiers quickly, because he's resourceful and good at finding stuff the boys like, like booze and...more booze. 

(Holy shit, am I making Zapp Branigan? "All I asked from my men was their complete loyalty. If I had that, for all I cared they could sit around all day drinking beer in their underpants.")

"Beer?" "Underpants?"

OK, anyway. Next up I get 7 points of Skills, which means I'm not making Zapp, since "skill" isn't really what he does. Let's put two each into Subterfuge, Tactics, and Wandering, and the last one into Folkways. 

And then I get 2 bonuses chosen from a number of lists. I don't...think it matters which list? So why break them in lists at all? Maybe it matters for advancement. Let's take Stocked and Defiant.

Cool, that's everything for my Commander. Let's name him Palan Ludwick. He's a scruffy sort of fellow, always needs a shave and a haircut (two bits), but can actually clean up when he needs to (like when he's requesting provisions). Might be played by Diego Luna.

And then the next thing I'd do is draft a Unit. Eh, what the heck. I start by picking five kinds of characters I can draw from. Is there a list? I thought at first it was stuff like "Human," but then it says it's stuff like "Adept" and "Siren," so I guess it's more specific than that. Ugh, fine. Well, I'll take Raider and Rebel. Bounty Hunter sounds good. I want a beast, and War Elk sounds dope. Oh, and Rogue, obviously. My Unit is gonna be better for assassination or waylaying than, like, glorious battle. 

But I think that'll do it! 

Movie #953: The Lost World: Jurassic Park

The Lost World: Jurassic Park is the sequel to Jurassic Park, still directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Vince Vaughn, Richard Schiff, Pete Postlethwaite, Arliss Howard, Richard Attenborough, and Vanessa Lee Chester. 

Four years after the events of Jurassic Park, Dr. Ian Malcolm (Goldblum) is...well, we're not sure what he's doing. He makes reference in the movie to losing his livelihood and his tenure, so presumably whatever university he was at canned him, but apart from badly needing a shave he looks OK. Anyway, he's summoned to the home of John Hammond (Attenborough) and told that the dinosaurs were only shown on Isla Nublar, but actually grown on Isla Sorna (so, presumably, the eggs we see hatching in the first one would be...shipped back? But then why does Hammond say he's been "present for the birth of every living thing on this island?" Eh, never mind). And he's managed to keep InGen from, like, marketing dinosaur steaks or something, but after an incident involving a British family he's been ousted. So Hammond sends a team to make a video record of the dinosaurs in hopes to get public opinion on their side, consisting of documentarian Nick Van Owen (Vaughn), field equipment guy Eddie (Schiff), and paleontologist Sarah Harding (Moore)...who happens to be Ian's girlfriend. Hammond wanted Ian to be another member of the crew; Ian immediately pushes to leave immediately because Sarah's already on site. 

(As a side note, it occurs to me that Ian was actually a silly choice for this trip. If you wanted to try and rope anybody from the first go into this, why not Ellie or Alan, either of whom might have been more sympathetic to the aims of the expedition and definitely more knowledgeable? Eh, never mind.)

So the expedition arrives, they take some photos of some stegosaurus..es, and almost immediately a huge team from InGen shows up, led by Hammond's remarkably slimy nephew Ludlow (Howard) and this movie's best new character, big game hunter Roland (Postlethwaite). They're there to capture some dinosaurs for transport back to San Diego for the opening of Jurassic Park! Ian just wants to get home, particularly once it's revealed that his daughter Kelly (Chester) stowed away. 

Everything goes tits up, obviously, Roland finds and injures a baby t-rex to lure the parents so he can shoot one (great plan), the t-rexes rock up like "WE'RE WHAT YOU CAME TO SEE" and eat Eddie, Nick sabotages the InGen camp, which is great, fight the power and all, but it does wreck their shit so they can't signal for help, so now the whole troupe has to go through the jungle and the velociraptor-infested grasslands to find the one working MacGuffin radio on the island!

And that, my friends, is the end of Act Two. Act Three takes place in San Diego, because Roland manages to tranquilize the male t-rex and Ludlow takes it (and the baby) back with him. The t-rex gets loose (obvs), goes romping through San Diego, eats a bunch of people and a dog you fucking monster and then gets lured back to the boat and kills Ludlow, because no way was that fucker getting out of this movie alive. 

When it came out, this movie was kinda regarded as a lackluster sequel, and if I'm honest, I was a little surprised to remember that Spielberg directed it (but then, he was also the mastermind behind Indiana Jones & The Temple of Doom so it ain't like the man can do no wrong). But I think it's aged OK. The effects hold up, the CGI isn't bad - it helps that the dinos are practical when they can be. Goldblum does a nice job of showing us what four years of being disbelieved and discredited have done to Malcolm, and the new supporting cast is tight and manage to give us some memorable people. I especially love Postlethwaite's Roland Tembo, particularly because he doesn't stay past the end of Act Two - he bags his prize (the male t-rex, though he doesn't kill it the way he'd wanted to), but realizes that the human cost of this nonsense is too great and buggers off. 

I'm ambivalent about Chester's Kelly. Well, I think the actress did fine. I just don't know that we needed the character. Sure, it gives Malcolm a little more to do, and yes, it was established in the first movie that he likes having kids (though is perhaps more interested in, erm, the first part of the process, as it were). But I dunno, I think Goldblum and Moore and capable enough actors that they could have made these people and their arcs interesting without the kids. Though of course, then we wouldn't have a raptor get killed by gymkata. 

The other big issue, though, is the boat plot hole. The ship crashes into San Diego harbor with a t-rex in the cargo hold, but the crew on the deck is all dead (and ripped to pieces), including in a small control room, and one crewman's hand is clutching the controls for the cargo hold doors. So, did the t-rex...eat the crew and spit body parts into the cabin? Dive into the cargo hold as the doors were closing? 

(This question has an answer, and the answer is: There was a scene that made clear that velociraptors got on board the ship before it left, but guess what, that scene ain't in the movie so it didn't happen so it's a plot hole. Eh, never mind.)

My Grade: B-
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

Next up: The Masque of the Red Death

Character Creation: Lucid: Sea of Dreams

Sea dreams are made of fish, whom am I to disagree.

The Game: Lucid: Sea of Dreams
The Publisher: The Games Gardener
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Games where you romp through dreams are nothing new, going all the way back to Shattered Dreams (to my knowledge, that was the first one). Shattered Dreams suffers from being way too 90s, but there are some more modern examples: WILD, Dreampunk, that game that Kai wrote for Game Chef the one year. Lucid seems a pretty simple game. System wise, you just roll d10s, and I think difficulty is assigned via target number? Except...the book says that a difficulty of 4-5 is "challenging." Um, no it ain't. Your odds are actually pretty good of rolling a 4 or better on a d10 (they're 60%, in fact), and if you're rolling three dice your chances of getting an 8 or better are about 82%, I think, because we ran those numbers for NWoD (I may be a little off, but the point is the odds are good). So why is difficulty 8 listed as "Absurdly Difficult?" As always, of course, I'd have to run it to know for sure.

The book itself is pretty well-written, though. There's not much setting, but there's enough - there are emotion-centered dream thingies that perpetuate and feed on particular feelings, there are places in the dreamscapes that you can go (and a crocodile-headed bartender named Lyle-Lyle). Writing about dreams and getting the tone of "weird and nonsensical but not totally rando" is hard, but I think this game pulls it off OK. And, I think it would a lot easier to pick up and play than the games I linked above (especially Shattered Dreams, holy shit). 

So let's make a Dreamer! I'm asked a few questions to start with: 

How did you go Lucid? It's like going rabid, I guess. No, seriously, I think my character was an addict. Let's say he was in a bad car accident and fucked up his legs pretty badly, and got hooked on painkillers while in rehab for those injuries. He kicked his addiction and one of the tools he used was lucid dreaming. Let's name him Adrian Soap. 

What are your goals? They're specifically asking about motivations for traveling the Sea of Dreams, here. I think in Adrian's case, it's for novelty and creative fulfillment. Adrian-in-Dreams can fly (or how about just run), solve problems that require heroics or profundity. That's...maybe not intoxicating, but definitely diverting. 

Who are you in the Waking World? Adrian was an IT professional who kind of fell into his job. He got t-boned by a drunk driver and now "guy who got t-boned" has sort of become who he is, and he rather hates that. At least when people find out he's a recovering addict, that's something he can own. 

Now I get to pick an Avatar. An Avatar in the Sea of Dreams can be anything, which is a little daunting. I don't see Adrian's as being too abstract, given how he came to Lucid Dream, so let's say his Avatar is a living statue. His apartment window faced a park, and there was a bronze statue of...somebody, some general or other, he thinks. He used to stare at it while falling asleep and used it as a touchstone for centering himself while dreaming, so it's kind of what he looks like in Dreams unless he changes it. He still has his own features, though, not the statue's.

Attributes! There's 3, I get 9 points, I can't go over 5 in any one of them. I think Resistance and Influence are going to be higher than Intuition. Let's put 1 into Intuition and 4 each into the other ones? Wait, do I get a free one to start? No, doesn't look like it. OK, let's go Intuition 2, Resistance 3, Influence 4. 

I get three Items, but they don't have to be literal items, they can be memories or sensations or whatever. In Adrian's case, I think he's got "the smell of rain", "a bottle of pills", and "pain."

I start with 5 Lucidity, and that's it, kids! The sheet has slots for Fears, Hopes, and Beliefs, though, are those meant to be anything in particular? I think it's just meant to be places to flesh out the character, because those terms aren't mentioned in any game context in the text. 

OK, sure. We'll say Adrian fears hospitals and medical stuff. He's more afraid of getting addicted again, but he also knows that some pain is too intense for just gritting your teeth and powering through. He hopes to find something as fulfilling in the Waking World as the Sea of Dreams, because asking people "did you turn it off and on again" ain't doing it for him. And he believes that people don't choose to be addicts and folks who say it's a moral failing as judgmental assholes. Also that The Great Escape is the greatest movie ever made. 

That'll do it!

Marvel: Enter Mount Wundagore!

Back to superheroes for the third and final Act! Here's last time.

Our heroes swoop in towards Mount Wundagore, and the weather immediately turns against them. Snow and blinding hail kicks up, and it's all Maria and Bucky can do to keep the quinjet level. But they break through the weather and see the cave entrance that Spidey saw in his vision - and three figures waiting for them.

Two of them are the huge rock monsters that Spidey saw before, but the third is a more normal-sized human with a long cloak. They can't quite make out other features, but they see the figure move their arms and then a beam of magical energies streaks towards them! Maria takes evasive action, and then has to do it again as the rock-monsters hurl boulders at the jet. But Maria is a hell of a pilot, and the quinjet turns around and lands. The back opens, and the heroes exit the plane into battle!

The figure, horribly, turns out to be Doctor Stephen strange, whom we last saw back here. But his flesh is pale and sallow, his eyes and milky, and he looks, well, dead. "Necromancy," mutters Magnus. "Don't see that every day."

Bucky takes up a position by the plane and gets the attention of the rock-monsters, who tromp over towards him, fists raised. Maria runs and slides past Strange, and sees into the cave. She sees carvings on the walls that make her eyes itch, and a huge stone slab that's clearly meant for sacrifice. Wanda Maximoff hovers above it in the lotus position, and behind her, the bas-relief of the Scarlet Witch. She doesn't acknowledge Maria or the situation out front.

Spidey tries out his brand-new taser-webs at Strange, but the amulet around Strange's neck opens and Spidey sees into eternity. A good grounding in science and a generally strong mind keep him from going mad, but it's a near thing. Magnus, now able to teleport more freely as the Null-Dimension Cloak keeps him unobserved, appears behind Strange and attempts to magic him away, but Strange counters the spell. Maria lashes out her whips at Strange, but doesn't realize Magnus is in the way (since he's invisible) and he gets a brief jolt - but more to the point, is made visible for a moment. 

Strange turns and the amulet on his chest opens again, and Magnus is silhouetted in blue for a second...but he blows sand in the amulet's eye and forces it to close before his Cloak and be compromised. The rock monsters close on Bucky and one of them throws a punch; Bucky blocks it with his metal arm, but the other one punches him in the back! Bucky grits his teeth (and moves his stress die to the doom pool), and punches the other one, cracking its chest, and trusting the team to have his back. And they do - Spidey, realizing that Strange is more a Magnus problem, fires a bunch of webs and yanks the other rock-monster back. 

Strange casts a spell and the shadows on the ground reach up and grab the heroes, worming into the cracks in their souls - all except Magnus. His cloak just sucks up the shadow and devours it. Maria unleashes her electro-whips and lashes Strange's arms, and Magnus follows up with a splash of holy water that melts his flesh. Spidey yeets the rock-monster off the cliff, and Bucky punches the other one again, cracking it further, but it raises up its arms and pounds him into the ground - he blocks with his metal arm but this thing is far too strong. Bucky picks himself up, wipes the blood from his nose, and throws one more punch, crumbling the rock-monster into chunks. 

Meanwhile, Maria tries to up the voltage on Strange and put him down, Magnus fires an energy weapon from somewhere in his Hat, and Spidey just swings over and punches him, but physical attacks don't bother the zombie. Bucky even pulls his head off, but it floats back up and reattaches itself. His cloak detaches and tries to wrap around Maria's face, but she dodges. 

And then something changes. Purple, flaking patches appear under Strange's dead eyes, and he speaks in a voice that echoes in all four heroes' heads. They feel the owner of that voice seeing them, and then Strange's head falls off, his body collapses, and from the depths of the cave, the heroes hear the clack of Wanda's shoes on the stone. 

They have the Scarlet Witch's attention. 

Character Creation: Cursed Captains of Cthulhu

Sounds like something Hermes Conrad would say.

The Game: Cursed Captains of Cthulhu
The Publisher: Black Cats Gaming
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

So this one was kind of a shitshow on Kickstarter. Rather, the campaign was fine, they raised about $31K on a $20K-ish goal (they're working pounds, not dollars), very communicative. And then the pledge manager went up in January 2022, about six months after the campaign closed, and like an idiot I kind of blindly clicked through because normally what happens is that companies don't charge you shipping until the book is done and ready to ship, so that they know, like, how much it actually costs (this, by the way, was not the norm when RPGs started hitting Kickstarter, meaning you had to fold shipping costs into the pledges and just make it your best guess, which really fucked me on my first couple of campaigns). 

Anyway, Black Cats charged shipping right away, and they charged more than the price of the hardcover in shipping! And yes, this was right around the time that the initial tariff fuckery was happening, but that's still far too much. There was of course a bit of an outcry, I think they actually did lower the prices somewhat but I still paid $50 for shipping on a $40 book, and the book was delivered more than 2 years past the estimated delivery date anyway. So not a great start.

But...the cover is pretty cool. I hadn't cracked the book until last night (this is not uncommon, it often takes me a couple of years to get around to reading an RPG unless I have a reason to look into it sooner, like if I'd wanted to run a pirate-themed or Mythos-themed game), and...it looks tentatively pretty cool. The writing could be clearer in paces, but they do give examples (not a fully written example of chargen, but you can't have everything). 

Could've used a proofreader, is my point

System looks workable, I think? Add stats, roll 4d6, check against a difficulty. I don't understand why you'd use four dice instead of two; maybe they just wanted bigger numbers, but it feels like the probabilities would get weird. 

Setting wise, yeah, it's what's in the box. They're very careful to say they've excised slavery from the setting (in fact, they repeat the text talking about it at least once), and, like, sure, it's not something I want to engage with when telling pulpy magic pirate stories, either. There's probably an interesting point to be made about ignoring (or removing) racism from a Lovecraft-inspired setting in the interest of making everything less uncomfortable, but I'm by no means the guy to make that point. Anyway, Cursed Captains also points readers to Harlem Unbound, which is just a smart move.

So let's make a cursed captain! Step One: Choose Your Starting Profession. There's a cool compass-wheel motif here; there are professions around the spokes and as you go south, f'rex, you're more magically capable, while north is more combat capable. Now, suppose you wish to make a combat-mage? I don't know if that's just discouraged or what. 

The book says that there are eight starting professions, though, which is weird because there are actually fifteen listed. So are seven of them advanced or something? Hang on, let's figure this out. 

OK, that's gotta be a misprint, because there is nothing in the book designating any profession as a "starting profession" as opposed to an "advanced profession" or something. Also, more than eight of them are referred to as "starting professions" elsewhere in the book. Guys. 

So basically I can pick one of fifteen Professions to start. Um. I think I'd like to do magical shit today, thanks much - the setting is obvious very high-magic, though as presented magic is meant to have "at your own peril" sort of vibe, which is fine. Looking at the compass, it's interesting to me that Rigger (the one that works in the rigging, not like my dwarf in Shadowrun) is as far south on the compass as it is, but I guess it had to be somewhere. 

You know, I actually made a character for a setting like this for a setting-agnostic game called Chimera, and it's been rattling around at the back of my head the whole time I was reading this game. I don't like to repeat myself, so I don't want to do a character like Cangrejo, so let's take a different tack and make an Exorcist, someone who's still magical but in a much more disciplined way.

Step Two: Characteristics. I get 8 points to throw around. The descriptions of how this step works are really muddled; there are a couple of ways to do it randomly but it's mostly "roll some dice, add some points, stop when you hit 8," so I don't much see the point. As an exorcist I get 2 points in Abjure (the characteristics and skills aren't capitalized, kind of the opposite problem a lot of RPGs have). I can take up to 3, but if I do that I can't take any points in Accuracy (the characteristic on the opposite side of the wheel). 

Guess I should conceptualize a little, huh? I think the other pirates call my guy the Monk. He's not a monk, but he keeps himself to a very high moral and physical standard, and the result is he's a bit of a pill. You're gonna want his ass around when the monsters burble up from the depths, though. 

I get 8 points to throw around, not counting my two free in Abjure. Let's see. I'll leave Savvy and Harness at 0...oh, wait, no, Harness helps determine Courage. Argh. OK, fine. 0s in Savvy and Studies, 2 in Harness, Seafaring, and Brawn, and 1 each in Accuracy and Melee. 

My Health is 14, my Courage is 14, my Initiative is 12, and my Evasion is 10 (it's based on Savvy for some reason). 

Step Three: Skills. Looks like these are binary (you've either got 'em or not) but I can't find how many you get. It says you can pick any you meet the requirements for, but surely that'll be too many, right? I know I get Courage of the Pure by dint of being an Exorcist. I get the Otherworldly Insight skill, too, and the write-up in the Exorcist Profession says that "doesn't count as an extra skill chosen during character creation," whatever the fuck that means. 

Well, the example characters in the Quickstart each have three Skills, except the Exorcist has four, which makes sense. So I guess you get your Profession's Skill and then two more? It literally does not say that in the book anywhere that I can find. Glad this took two years of extra development, if they'd rush it there might have been mistakes. 

All right, snark aside, let's see, what should Monk have? Well, I think Sea Hand makes sense, and then I'll take Deep Diver (gives me bonus to do sailing stuff and to dive into the deeps, respectively). 

I can also take any Traits I want, which are basically flaws. It doesn't look like they do you much good, but I might well be missing something and I can be arsed to figure it out. Let's make Monk...Cannibalistic! (I'm kidding, but that's really in the book.) No, actually, I'm gonna take Cannot Lie.

Step Four: Personal Style. Basically the "everything else" stage. Oh, hang on, do I start with any spells? Yes I do, I start with four. Does...why isn't that in the chargen section? Jesus. 

Well, anyway, let's take my four spells. Definitely taking Cleansing Hands (which lets me dispel magic on people). Desalinate is one of those spells that in real life would be hella useful (it makes salt water drinkable), so sure, let's do that. I'll take Inner Resolve (lets me give someone a buffer against losing Courage), and an offensive spell sounds like a good idea, so I'll take Slashing Light (exactly what it sounds). 

Cool, now the details. I think Monk is balding (which contributed to the nickname), but has a ring of brown hair. He wears a simple wooden cross, and follows ship's rules scrupulously. He doesn't really get why people call him Monk - the hair thing, sure, but he drinks and whores with the rest of the crew, so what's the big deal? 

That'll do it. Yet another example of a character I like in a game I find real iffy. 

Movie #952: The Lego Batman Movie

The Lego Batman Movie is an animated spinoff of The Lego Movie, starring Will Arnett, Michael Cera, Rosario Dawson, Ralph Fiennes, Zach Galifianakis, and a whole bunch of other recognizable folks in smaller roles. 

In the "Gotham City", or maybe just "DC" section of Finn's basement, Batman (Arnett) is going through the motions protecting the city from the Joker (Galifianakis) and a whole host of other Batman villains. Joker escapes, but poses to Batman that he either needs to disarm the bomb threatening to destroy Gotham or capture his "greatest foe," to which Batman responds that he doesn't have a greatest foe, and Joker means nothing in particular to him. 

Joker, crushed, manipulates Batman into sending him to the Phantom Zone wherein dwell the greatest villains of history, including Voldemort (Eddie Izzard), King Kong (Seth Green), the Wicked Witch of the West (not sure; wiki says Riki Lindhorne; she voiced Poison Ivy but the Witch isn't specifically credited), and, um, the Velociraptor from Jurassic Park. He then arranges for Harley Quinn (Jenny Slate) to open the floodgates and let all these villains out again.

Meanwhile, Batman is dealing with the retirement of Jim Gordon (Héctor Elizondo) and his replacement by his daughter Barbara (Dawson), and the fact that he accidentally adopted an orphan named Dick (Cera). Alfred (Fiennes) also constantly tries to get him to admit that he's lonely and wants a family again, but Batman is bound and determined to be alone. 

In the end, Gotham is saved, the villains are returned to the Phantom Zone, and Batman admits how much the Joker means to him (finally saying "I hate you"). Dick, having already come into the role of Batman's sidekick "Robin", Alfred (wearing the 60s Batman outfit), and Barbara (now as Batgirl, not that she's crazy about the name) become the Bat-family and...all live together at the mansion? Sure, why not! 

You know, given that this movie isn't written by the same ones that wrote The Lego Movie (though they produced), they pretty much nailed the humor. The conceit of the franchise is that it's all play from Finn, and The Lego Movie did a really nice job of nailing a child's understanding of the morality and beats that you'd see in this kind of beats. That happens here, too - we see Batman through the eyes of someone who's clearly a fan, knows his history and all his rogue's gallery (right down to Condiment King), but sees the central conflict of the character as being a loner rather than the heavier themes of later stuff about the character. Likewise, Joker is scary because he's a clown with a creepy smile, not because he's a homicidal maniac. Violence is treated very cartoonishly and, well, childishly - everyone says "pew pew!" when they fire guns, and the stakes are big and dangerous in a Saturday morning cartoon kind of way.

The result is that it doesn't have the same emotional weight as The Lego Movie, since it's not about Finn and his dad, but that's OK - it's fun, it's light, and I didn't realize how much I needed to see a superhero movie that leans fully into how ridiculous the genre is until I rewatched this. 

I remember being skeptical of a whole movie around Will Arnett's Batman, just because his schtick of DARKNESS might wear thin, but the supporting cast makes a big difference. Michael Cera is bouncy and joyful as Robin, Rosario Dawson gets to be the competent adult in the room (well, she splits it with Alfred), and Galifianakis puts his own spin on the Joker rather than trying to be Mark Hamil. 

I don't think it's as good as The Lego Movie, but it's actually better than I remember from the first time I saw it. 

My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

Next up: The Lost World: Jurassic Park

Character Creation: Wytch Mountain

Myst by thy syysyn yf thy wytch.

The Game: Wytch Mountain
The Publisher: Knight Owl Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: "Book," sure.

I mean, it's a zine and it never claimed to be anything else. I don't know why "witch" is misspelled, and I don't know what part of this they think is folk horror, other than the fact that there's witches in it. It's one of these "bare-bones systems, character creation, bestiary, iunno, get to it" sorts of games, and frankly I need to stop backing these because they just feel half-done to me. But it's also only 34 pages and I'm pressed for time today, so hyry wy gy! (I'll stop.)

First thing we do is roll for Ability Scores, which in this case are Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence. Sure. (As a side note, why in a game about witches are we giving physical stuff more granularity than mental/spiritual?) Anyway, we roll and check if the dice are even/odd and in what combination. Both even is the most desirable result. So we get: 2,2; 2,6; 4,1. So close! So my Strength and Dexterity are both +2 and my Intellgience is +1. Noice. 

Oh, bother, I went and wrote those scores in, but your class can change them. Serves me right for not reading ahead. Anyway, next step is Class. I think I wanna be a Leyline Witch. That boosts my Dexterity and Int by one (+3 and +2, respectively). I get a dagger, an Amulet of Protection, some bone jewelry, and my first spell is Tell Me Your Secrets (I can force someone to tell the truth with a bit of hair or fingernail).

Cool. My HP is 1d6 + Str, so...4 (ugh). My Warding is 10 + Dex + any other bonuses. Do I have any? Yeah, I get +1 from my amulet. So that's 14. I start with 1d6 gold pieces, which is the only thing that tells me we're in a fantasy setting (and I rolled a 1). I get Spell Points equal to INT + level, so 3 for me.

Roll 2d6 for a weakness...I cannot step over salt. And then I get a Last Curse; I can only cast it once and it kills me, so it's best saved for when I'm dying anyway. I roll and get...The Withering. One target's STR drops by 1d6. Hopefully that's enough to kill a motherfucker.

That's it! Let's name my witch Bartleby. Bartleby is big on doorways and thresholds - everything's on the other side of something. That's probably why a doorway blocked with salt fucks with him so - salt is curative, preservative, and draws out the life; it makes a door not a door. Anyway, Bartleby is skinny, gaunt, and has a habit of popping out from behind doors. 

Movie #951: The Core

The Core is a disaster/sci-fi flick starring Aaron Eckhart, Hilary Swank, Stanley Tucci, Delroy Lindo, Richard Jenkins, D.J. Qualls, Tcheky Karo, Bruce Greenwood, and Alfre Woodard.

Joshua Keyes (Eckhart) and his French colleague Serge (Karo) are called upon to explain why thirty people dropped dead when their pacemakers failed suddenly. Keyes almost immediately figures it was an EMP of some kind, but not a weapon, as it was too indiscriminate, and in the first of many tropey decisions, the general investigating the matter (Jenkins; the general, not the matter) says "welp, that's all we wanted, deuces."

Yeah, but it turns out the rotation of the Earth's core has stopped! And...that's going to lead to superstorms and solar winds cooking us and it's just really bad, OK? Fortunately Keyes manages to bring together a crack team of quirky experts: himself, Serge, arrogant famous smart-guy Nimsky (Tucci), Nimsky's former partner Brazzelton (Lindo), expert hacker Rat (Qualls), and space shuttle pilots Bec (Swank) and Iverson (Greenwood). Braz has developed a material literally called unobtanium (but like, he knows what it means to call it that and the cast laughs over it, so it's not quite as tropey as, say, Avatar on that point) that will get stronger as it gets hotter or something, and off they go to restart the Earth with nuclear bombs!

Look, does any of this make any scientific sense? No, of course not. That's like asking why there are dinosaurs eating cavemen in Caveman, it's a misunderstanding of the genre. The Core is a "team of experts save the world" movie in the vein of Armageddon, Deep Impact (though that plays this a little straighter), Sunshine, and Daylight Saving Time. It's got all the hallmarks - the top brass trying to salvage the situation by blowing up the world when something goes wrong, people sacrificing themselves for the greater good, and our heroes (that'd be Bec and Keyes) managing to escape against all odds at the end.

As I said when talking about Lake Placid, if you're going to do a movie this schlocky, blow the money on the cast. And the cast here is fantastic and professional and jumps into it whole-heartedly. Eckhart is our everyman and actually manages to be a somewhat interesting character; he's not cowardly, but he's not overtly courageous, either. D.J. Qualls plays "movie hacker" perfectly, but I like the fast friendship he strikes up with Keyes. Tucci is perfect as the well-dressed, utterly full of himself Carl Sagan-ish character (if Sagan were an utter douchebag). And Lindo, despite South Park reducing his role to "black guy who sacrifices himself" in their parody episode, actually has every reason to be the one who goes to his death when he does.

Been wanting to find this on DVD for a while, now I have, life is good. If I have to watch a not-great movie, it's nice to do it on my own terms. 

My Grade: B-
Rewatch Value: High

Next up: The Lego Batman Movie

Misspent Youth: Alas, Poor Perry

Last night we played Misspent Youth...but we're down to four players (Perry's player, turns out, is allergic to my dogs and it was getting bad. My dogs, for their part, figured if they just licked her more it would help, but like, that just makes it worse). 

Anywho! Our Authority Figures:

• Sporelings: Little innocuous-looking mushroom creatures that sprang up in the wake of last session's "fruiting season"
• Gil: A Tendril who now has half his face melted off, as depicted here
• Aunt Lydia: A very prim, proper woman capable of administering the Torpor Timeout
• The Monitors: A group of Tendrils tasked with getting all the kids back in school

And our Friendship Questions:

• Quinn asks Sandy: "Why are you acting so weird lately?" Answer: "There's lots going on. Why aren't you?"
• Sandy asks Sparky: "What are you going to do now that you can't go back to your team?" Answer: "There's always sandlot."
• Sparky asks Tate: "What do we need to do to set up our space for your parents?" Answer: "Probably another clean room, made more habitable."
• Tate asks Quinn: "When did you last hear from your dad?" Answer: "About a month ago; he's away on business but is supposed to be back soon."

Scene One: What's Up

I set this up and chose the Monitors. 

The clique is at what was once a skate park. It's become overgrown and the concrete cracked, but it's a good place to hang out and plot. They realize that they haven't seen Perry in a while - he was staying with Tate's family, but Tate hasn't seen him, either. They also start talking about what they'd need to do to set up another clean room. 

But just then, a crunch of gravel under tires! They see a van pull up and three men get out, confer briefly (and the YOs can see the thin, downy mycelium on their faces), and then start to look around. The YOs run, and one of the Monitors drops into a weird, loping sprint and catches up with Quinn, and she spritzes it in the face with the Tonic. Its face starts to unravel but the rest of it keeps moving forward. 

Sparky stands up, and, thinking Fast, grabs a chunk of concrete and hurls it at the Monitor. This knocks it back and it lets out a puff of spores, but it keeps coming. Quinn stands up and gets Tough, shoving it down. Another one grabs Sparky from behind and its arms start growing together. Meanwhile, Sandy stands up and lets her Cloying scent distract the one chasing Quinn, and Tate stands up and hurls a knife at the Monitor like the Bad Seed he is. The knife strikes home and some brown gunk oozes out.

Quinn stands up again and channels her Outrage. She shoves the Monitor down and starts pounding on it, and Tate stands up and wins on Quinn's Outrage and joins in. They pound the Monitoring into pace, and then pull the one off of Sparky. They learn that once these things get a dose of tonic, they actually come apart pretty easily...

Our Kickoff: The YOs escape the skate park. 

Scene Two: Fighting Back

Sandy's player set this up and chose the Sporelings. 

The YOs run away from the skate park and wind up at the baseball field by the school. It's been converted into a kind of nursery, a huge field covered in brown plant debris that the fungus is devouring. The YOs catch their breath and they decide that they should just burn this whole thing, and Sparky suggests they break into the maintenance shed again, grab some supplies, and go to town. He and Quinn get to work on the door, Tate keeps watch, and Sandy hears a weird trill from the field...

She looks over, and sees what looks like a small white cat moving towards her. As she gets closer, she realizes it's actually a large lion's mane mushroom with two big brown "eyes" on the front of it. The thing trills at her again and Sandy is horrified. She runs back to the clique ("Cat mushroom! CAT MUSHROOM!") to find a weed whacker. Tate sees this thing and is somewhat less horrified (it's kind of cute...), but is still wary. 

Sandy stands up and comes back out with the weed whacker, using her knowledge as a Forager to know how to hit these things without spewing spores everywhere. But a bunch more charge at her, trying to pile up on top of her! Tate stands up and helps fight back (no way his Pride is going to let his friends get eaten by cat-mushrooms), and Sparky rides a lawnmower into the field with a can of gasoline. Quinn spots a bunch of the Sporelings running for the road and stands up, winning on Sandy's Forager. She grabs a hoe and drags a section of garlic grass across Sporelings' path, driving them back and into the flames! The whole field goes up in fire, and the YOs stand back and watch their handiwork.

Our first Beat is a Reversal: The YOs burn the Sporeling fields. The Question is: How will the Tangle respond?

Scene Three: Heating Up

Sparky's player set this up, and chose Aunt Lydia. 

Following immediately from the last scene, the school doors open and Aunt Lydia steps out. She looks at the fire and then at the YOs, points at them, and opens her mouth. A stream of teenagers pours out of the school and sprints straight for them! The YOs run, trying to stay insight of each other.

Sandy stands up and manages to keep ahead of the Silver Spores; as a Sun-Lover, she's comfortable in the outdoors (yeah, it's a little thin). Tate stands up and loses...but sells out Pride to Arrogant. He barks orders at the rest of the YOs, telling them what to do to get away, and they listen, though they're not thrilled at the tone. The YOs escape into the town and head for Quinn's house.

Scene Four: We Won

Quinn's player sets this up and picks the Friendship Question from Tate to Quinn: "When did you last hear from your dad?" Answer: "About a month ago; he's away on business but is supposed to be back soon."

The YOs get to Quinn's house and lie low a bit. They still don't know where Perry's got to and they're a little horrified to see how many of their fellow teens have been infected. And then a van pulls into the driveway! 

Sparky grabs a bat and spritzes some Tonic on it. Tate hides behind a couch. Sandy ducks into the kitchen. Quinn tells them all to relax, it's just her dad, but of course they don't know if he's one of them. He walks in to the house and calls out "Quinnie? Why are all the lights-" when Tate gives him a spritz of Tonic. 

He spits a bit. "Bleach, what the hell? Tastes like vinegar and...sunflower seeds." Quinn, relieved that he's not melting, tries to tell him what's going on, but he's been out of town for a while and doesn't know. 

(A side note: I wish, in hindsight, we'd have defined a little better what the state of the world is, because it's kind of gone from "post apocalyptic" to "mid-apocalyptic" to "apparently it's just right around here that's fully Tangle'd", but part of the nature of Misspent Youth is a certain amount of making it up as you go.)

Quinn's dad (Roger) is having trouble buying all this. Tate calls his dad to have another adult talk to Roger. They talk for a moment, and Roger says he's going to go meet Guy and talk with him in person. He tells the YOs to stay up; he still doesn't fully buy this but can tell something's up. He gets in the van and heads out.

The YOs hang out and rest, but in a while Tate gets a call from his dad. Guy says that he's seen Roger's van go past the turn-off towards the clean room a couple of times, but he's apparently lost. Quinn calls her dad's cell...and hears it ring, as he's left it on the table ("ugh, he's always doing this"). The YOs grab a couple of bikes out of the garage and head off to go find him.

As they're heading through town, they notice people turning to look at them. Sparky hits a bump and slips the bike chain, and a fellow leaning on a wall kind of peels off and walks toward them. Sandy stands up and in her most Unctuous voice tells the guy that they're just passing through. They start biking off, and the man releases a mouthful of floating spores...everyone else in the area turns to watch them, too. Tate stands up and relies on his Influential nature to look like he belongs there, and Quinn stands up and pedals with a Relentless fury. But then they get out of town...and a cop car starts following.

Sparky stands up and, perhaps with a bit of Hubris, drops a couple of nails, thinking that it works in the movies. And the cop car does pop a tire, but keeps following! Tate stands up and wins on Sparky's Hubris, and randomly points to a turn-off to take. It works out, though; it's too sharp of a turn for the car and the YOs get away, and find Roger's van parked by the side of the road. 

They show him where the clean room is, and while he's still pretty confused, they manage to convince him to join them. 

Scene Five: We're Fucked

Tate's player set this up, and chose Sparky's question to Tate: "What do we need to do to set up our space for your parents?" Answer: "Probably another clean room, made more habitable."

We open at the clean room, as the YOs, Guy, and Roger talk about their next moves (Tate's mom is there, too, but she's still not doing great). Sparky finds a paper map of the area, and they all talk about what to do next. They figure that if they can find an abandoned structure to convert into a bigger "clean room," they can make more space for folks to live and, hopefully, fight against the Tangle. 

Guy notes that keep mold and fungus out is a matter of keeping things cool and dry; mold likes warm and moist environments. Roger says that with the right tools and supplies he can rig air purifiers and temperature control. The YOs ask about structures outside of town, and Roger says there's a box store that was going in on the north end of town, but construction has stopped (he's not sure why). The clique figures that'd work. 

They head out there that night to scout the place out, and break in. When they open the doors into the main building, they hear movement! Sparky shines a light around and sees a lot of people, including an elementary school teacher that they know. Sandy runs up to her ("Mrs. Plemons!") and asks what's going on; basically she's managed to help a bunch of people get out here and avoid the mushrooms.

The problem is that there are enough people here that when the YOs open the door, some of the folks panic! Faced the prospect of these folks running out into the night and potentially getting caught, Tate stands up and Arrogantly soapboxes about why they need to stay quiet and listen to the YOs. Quinn stands up and blocks the front doors (Tough), but they hear a back door slam open. Sparky stands up and loses, but sells out Optimism to Cynical. He recounts exactly what's going to happen if they Tangle finds them, and cows everyone into staying put.

This scene gives us our second Beat: Discovery (the refugees). The answer to the earlier Question (How will the Tangle respond?) is simply that they're actively searching for the YOs.

Scene Six: Who Wins?

I set this one up and chose Gil as the Authority Figure.

A little while later, Roger has gotten some supplies (rather, the YOs stole them) and started working on the HVAC. Mrs. Plemons comes to Sandy and asks if she's seen one of her students, a little boy named Perry? Sandy, with a sinking feeling, says that they know Perry, but last they knew he was staying with Tate's family. Mrs. Plemons says that he was here when the YOs showed up, but hasn't seen him since. Sandy wonders why he didn't make himself known, but maybe he panicked? She brings this to the others, and they remember hearing a back door slam open...

They go looking for him and find his slingshot near the back door. Quinn finds some tracks and they follow them to the road, and across the street is a copse of trees. As they get close, though, they find thin, white mycelium strung between the trees - this place is pretty heavily infected.

They press on and see a fallen tree covered with orange fungus, with what looks like a pair of legs sticking out of it. Sparky runs up and brushes the fungus off, but realizes too late that these legs are too big to belong to Perry. Gil sits up out of the pile of fungus, half of his face still gills and mushroom-flesh, the other half still horribly human.

He tries to say something, but all that comes out is a gurgle. Quinn stands up and lives up to her reputation as The One To Set It On Fire, and does the old "lighter and hairspray" trick. Gil turns and lets his human-face take the brunt, and as the flesh blisters, grabs a handful of fungus and smears it over the burnt skin. Tate stands up and, going on Family Ties (hoping to still find Perry), pushes Gil back, and Sparky stands up (Fast) to help. 

Tate winds up standing up and winning on Sparky's Fast conviction and the whole place goes up in flames. The YOs escape from the area as the fungus-infected forest, and Gil, burn...but still no sign of Perry. They have, however, won the episode. 

Scene Seven: Dust Settles

Sandy set this up, and chose Quinn's question to Sandy: "Why are you acting so weird lately?" Answer: "There's lots going on. Why aren't you?"

Sandy talks to the others and suggests leaving. Everything here is horrible, she's tired of mushrooms and she doesn't want to be one. There are adults taking over now, surely the teens shouldn't be doing the heavy lifting? Tate kind of agrees; why is this their problem? Sparky points out, though, that they've made so much progress and have been responsible for getting this started. Can they really walk away?

The YOs decide to continue looking for Perry, anyway, and go back to the site of the fire that burned up Gil. They find one single shoe with "PERRY" written in marker on the side, and continue searching the area. They find a shack on the edge of a field, and as they approach, they see fungus along the doors. 

Tate stands up (Family Ties) and goes looking inside (I think it was Tate; I didn't write it down but it doesn't much matter), but Quinn stands up, loses, and pushes past. Inside, they find Perry's clothes, empty but for fungus. The fungus goes halfway up the wall and stops - maybe it didn't grown farther because Perry had been exposed to the Tonic? The YOs don't know, and they leave the shack quietly, mourning their little friend. 

Aftermath

The YOs have managed to bring refugees and some capable adults together, forming a Resistance (as an Exploit). But do they still have the passion to be part of it?

Movie #950: Caveman

Caveman is a 1981 comedy starring Ringo Starr, Shelley Long, Barbara Bach, Dennis Quaid, John Matusak, and Jack Gilford. 

Eons ago, one October, a tribe of caveman led by the massive brute Tonda (Matusak) searches the landscape for food, and that's pretty much their daily grind. Atouk (Starr) is kind of a schlub, perhaps a little smarter than your average caveman, but is fully taken with Tonda's mate, Lana (Bach). Atouk winds up expelled from the tribe and bumps into his buddy Lar (Quaid), and then Tala (Long) and her father(?) Gog (Gilford). The four of them hook up with another tribe, discover fire and cooking and so forth, but Atouk is still so stuck on Lana that he goes back for her and winds up saving her from drowning (whereupon he kidnaps her). Lar, in the processes, is washed into a nearby ice age.

Atouk is ready to settle down with Lana (who, being something of an opportunist, immediately snuggles up with him), but his friends convince him that leaving Lar to die is a bit of a dick move, so they go and find him and rescue him from the clutches of a yeti (Richard Moll). Meanwhile, Tala leads Tonda to Lana, and Tonda's tribe abducts all of the women present (bit of an error in judgement, there, Tala). Atouk and his people arm themselves with weapons (another new invention) and defeat Tonda! Atouk tosses Lana aside (literally) and takes Tala as his mate! Zug-zug!

I'd heard of this movie when I was younger; I remember someone telling me about it when I was a kid because I remember "zug-zug" as a term for sex. I'd never seen it, though, and thanks to my friend Toasty it's now a movie I own. It's...actually not terrible. Sure, there's a bit of problematic content (like, um, Atouk trying to drug and rape Lana early in the movie; it's played for laughs like "look how bumbling he is, can't even zug-zug an unconscious woman" but let's just say it doesn't really land by today's standards), but on the other hand, there's a gay couple in the new tribe they hook up with and...it's just a thing. Like, Ruck (Mark King) and Flok (Paco Morayta) are just two characters, they're affectionate and snuggle up with each other, but neither of them are caricatures of gay men. 

Much of the humor is broad and physical and stems from cavemen doing dumb shit - blundering into dangerous situations, running from stop-motion dinosaurs, and wondering if something they've found is "ull" (food). It's interesting watching this on the heels of Larry the Farting Fart Guy: Fart, because there are fart jokes in Caveman, but they...if not work, then at least don't fuck up the flow of the movie, and I think that's because the characters don't belabor the point the way Larry does. 

Anyway, this movie didn't exactly do well and it's regarded as kind of a crappy movie, and I think it's maybe a bit underrated. Ringo Starr isn't exactly setting the screen alight with charisma, but he works OK as a put-upon everyman. It's a simple story, there are a couple of legitimately funny moments, and I really enjoy the simple cave-language they put together for the movie (consisting of about 15 words, so not exactly Elvish). 

My Grade: C
Rewatch Value: Medium or medium-high, I think?

Next up: The Core, unless Toasty gives me something else before I have a chance to watch it

Character Creation: Code Warriors

Kind of how you'd say "cold warriors" if you had a stuffed-up nose.

The Game: Code Warriors
The Publisher: Nerdburger Games
Degree of Familiarity: None, but it's not far, system-wise, from Good Strong Hands, which I have run
Books Required: Just the one

You know, Nerdburger Games consistently creates games that I want to run. Like, looking over their catalog, I've run Capers and Good Strong Hands, and Hypersleep Terminated has been a runner-up on one-shot nights for months now (meaning it's probably gonna happen sooner rather than later). That speaks well not only of the selection available (Craig Campbell gets his games done and published, which is more than I can say for some of the other ding-dongs in the industry) but they're consistently player-friendly and fun. 

Anyway, Code Warriors has you playing programs inside the System (just your basic computer system), all happily doing their bit, and then Collapse start and everything goes whack-a-ding-hoy. And things like "scarcity" and "dreams" become relevant, and the world starts falling apart. The game is billed as "Tron meets Mad Max", and that's pretty cool. I can absolutely see a (perhaps very dark) animated movie with this premise.

Indeed, "how dark?" is one of the session zero questions, and more specifically, "is there any hope of stopping the Collapse?" For purposes of this project that doesn't matter, but for a campaign it absolutely would. I think I'd prefer that the Collapse is inevitable and the conflict of the game is acceptance of that and completing whatever goals the programs have before the end, but I could also see a more PG-rated "plucky programs save the System" style game. Kind of Osmosis Jones, but like, less gross and 100% less Kid Rock. 

(Also, I have to say, I love that the game is that easy to explain. Compared to the one I did yesterday, which isn't a hard premise necessarily but it's so bland and so tied into a particular kind of media that it's hard to explain without getting into the weeds.)

Anyway, let's make a program! 

Set character to version 1.0, that's easy enough.

Choose program type. I think I want to play a Pix. Pix...es are graphic artists and creatives, and I think what I want to do is lean into the idea of an artist in a Lovecraftian kind of situation who's getting dreams of the End (see also: Fiver in Watership Down). 

Describe and give a name. Pixes are little floating cubes with four arms. They use one face as their primary one. I think my li'l Pix is name Hue. His primary face starts at black at the top and goes through the color spectrum to white at the bottom, manifesting features as necessary. Sometimes his other faces show spirals or weird, non-Euclidean vistas. Probably nothing to worry about.

Define three Anchors. Anchors are personality traits, basically; I get Juice when I play to them. For Hue, we'll say his Anchors are Mysterious, Intense, and Daydreamer. 

Define three Foci. These are people/places/things that I cling to as the world falls down. Well, "understanding the dreams" should be one. I'll say that "colors" is another - if Hue ever finds out that the numbers of colors you can "see" varies by what kind of eye you have, his head's gonna explode. And then I think it'd be cool if Hue knows about an image file that's lost somewhere (maybe in the Chasm) that he thinks might help with the Collapse. He's just started referring to it as pickman.jpg. He'd love to retrieve it.

Distribute points. I get 8 points to split between my 4 stats, min 1, max 3, average is 2. Let's see. My Body can be low, and actually so can Mind. Let's put those at 1 and Charm and Heart at 3.

Select two Specialties. Just things I'm good at. I think "Noticing Things" might be a good one; it'll key off of Mind and that's not where Hue is a Viking, but it's something he should be at least average at. And then I'll take System Knowledge; Hue knows things he doesn't know he knows.

Optional Features. I get two points to spend here, so I can take two Features at 1.0 or one at 2.0, and they're specific to my type. Let's see. Well, I want Paintbrush (I can paint a small item and then use it), and 2.0 lets it be a weapon, but eh. I'll take Enhanced TK as my other one, just lets me manipulate slightly bigger objects at a greater range.

Gear. I have 8 Juice to spend. Do I wish to spend anything? Eh, sure. Let's buy a glow-stick and a set of binocs. Oh, no, wait, I want a wrist rocket (fires a tow-line); I think with my TK and flight that'll be useful. That's 6 Juice, leaving me only 2 left, but that's fine, I'll just be all mysterious.

And that's actually it! Hue is ready to go investigate the Collapse, and perhaps learn the horrible, maddening truth of it all. 

Character Creation: The Dread of Night

As my dear departed friend Karafa used to say, it's not all A material. 

The Game: The Dread of Night
The Publisher: Fabletop Productions
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one, and maybe a Steam deck

One of the problems with only half paying attention to the games I back on Kickstarter is that I sometimes wind up backing games that look pretty cool on first blush (this, Renegade City, Overgrowth, Gears of Defiance, I could go on) but that fall down in the execution. 

Sometimes that's because the game itself isn't actually something I'm into, but I either didn't pay close enough attention to realize that or it wasn't clear from the pitch (The Island of Dr. Moreau, is, perhaps, an example here - if I'd paid attention I'd have known). Sometimes that's because the game's creators got their money and then realized it wasn't enough, mismanaged the funds, or otherwise figured out that making a game well is haaaard (there are any number of these, but the one on my mind at the moment is Heroic, a supers game that's presently a couple of years late and the creator is now saying that he might release the game with AI art just so he can get it done, after promising that everything was going to be made by, like, people, and what's really upsetting is the people in the comments going "yeah, do that" and I'm just sitting over here invisibly yelling "WHY ARE YOU MAKING IT EASIER FOR EVERYTHING TO GET SHITTIER"). And sometimes the game comes out and it's more or less what it was supposed to be, but that product is just kinda...meh?

So what's the deal with The Dread of Night? It's a fantasy monster-hunting game, inspired by video games that I haven't played (The Witcher, Dark Souls, Castlevania, etc.). And that's fine. I ran Darkest Days which was also inspired by some of these games, it was a good time. There are a couple of things that sort of rub me the wrong way about this game, thought.

First, the writing. It's not unreadable or egregious, but it seriously needed some proofreading and clean up. 

Fewer than none knew how to harness it? Huh?

But quite beyond the clumsy turns of phrase and the unnecessary capitalization, I don't love that this paragraph is prefaced with "Lore". It feels...I don't know, dismissive? Video-gamey? And I just keep thinking back to games like Fight Item Run and Heroes of Cerulea (which I just ran the other night), both of which take explicit inspiration from retro video games but wear that in their mechanics, their aesthetics, and everything about their presentation. 

And maybe what this really means is that modern video games of the "RPG" variety don't have their own aesthetic. Rather, any given game might, but what it is about about the look, the music, or the game play of these games that gives it identity? Or maybe that's an unfair question for me to ask, since those games generally aren't my vibe? I just think that putting a section called "Lore" in a TTRPG and using the term the way a video game would is weird, since TTRPGs are basically all lore. 

And then there's the second thing (yes, all that was one thing. Maybe one-and-a-half): This game purports to be a Powered by the Apocalypse game. You could have a long and interesting discussion about what makes a PbtA a PbtA game (and I have, more than once, in the Before Times when I was welcome in such spaces), and I'm never in any hurry to gatekeep and say that a game is or is not "really" the kind of game it's saying it is. But like...reading this game, it doesn't read or feel like a PbtA game. It feels like yet another slightly-darker D&D clone, drawing inspiration from Dark Souls instead of Lord of the Rings. The game mechanics aren't designed to move from the conversation and then back into it, they're just your standard "roll Agility to jump over a pit" kind of thing. The "playbooks" are just classes (with some admittedly dope artwork). The system is 2d6 + a stat, but the "moves" aren't triggered by anything and don't lead to any specific results. And again, none of this is required for a PbtA game, but like, what about this makes it a PbtA game?

What I'm saying is, I'm not impressed, and after the very enjoyable game that I did yesterday this is something of a let-down. But there's always tomorrow. 

The PDF is bookmarked, at least, though I never got copies of the playbooks so hopefully I can print one from the book directly.

Playbooks are classified in categories like "Rogue," "Mage", and "All-Rounder," just in case we forgot that the creators are big video game nerds. Anyway, there's no step-by-step for chargen that I can see...oh, no, wait, I found it.

All right, so clearly my first step is to choose a playbook/class. I'll take Rune Haunter: I like the art, the notion of a "Rogue/Mage" is appealing, and...that's all I've got, really. We're told, though, that Rune Haunters have "cursed gauntlets [that] are both a blessed and a curse." Great job, everybody. 

OK, so the long and the short of it is, my cursed gauntlets (which are both a blessing and a curse) have slots for magical gems that give me elemental powers and resistances. That's actually pretty cool. 

Name: I'm meant to pick a name first. There are some sample characters in the book, but the naming conventions aren't exactly consistent ("Grendel," "Elizabeth Buchard," "Abuela Monrietta", "Kaax Camal"), so let's just say my guy goes by Greyjack (used to be he was "Jack" with a family name, probably "Farmer" or something, but then...).

Life Before: I'm gonna pick "you were traveling when you ran into a merchant promising exotic wares." Jack was out at market to sell a cow (yep), when a fast-talking merchant managed to talk him into trading the cow for the gauntlets.

Life Now: Well, I think Jack is still a simple boy at heart, so he seeks to make the most of his curse and help people. 

Allocate: 9 points into Attributes. Well, Luck probably isn't high. Let's say Jack is nimble and strong and not terribly smart. Fuck it, can we leave these at 0? Oh, hell yeah, I can even go to -1. Well, let's take -1 in Luck, put 3 into Strength, Agility, and Arcane, leave Influence at 0 and put 1 into Wits. 

Check off: Specifically, my "Hunters [sic] amount [sic] of available moves." OK. My first "move" is Rune Magic, and basically I get to pick the elemental flavor of two gems. I'll pick Wind and Earth, how about. I get elemental charges when various things happen, and once a charge builds up I can release it as a beam or a punch or...another thing that I get to pick. Um...I'll take - oh, wait, hang on, I want Shake On It. If I make a deal with someone and we shake hands, I mark them with a Rune and if they break their word I can "gain a Haunt point," whatever that means. I think that's what happened to Jack, actually (he shook on a deal with the merchant, who was trying to give up the gauntlets). 

Boring shit: Select starting weapons, tools, snore. My primary weapon is my rune gloves, obvs, Earth gives me +1 Harm Reduction and Wind gives me +1 Evasion, but I can only use one at a time so neither of those bonuses are locked in, as it were. I think I want a Reinforced Cloak for my armor, though. And I get a tool which gives me some bonuses; I'll take a pouch (which gives me extra damage using Earth, for some reason). 

Playbook-specific stuff: I don't think I have any. Rather, I do, but it's covered already. 

Experience/Mastery at 0. OK, sure. What's my Health set to? 10 plus (Strength x 2), or 16 in my case. Neat. 

The last thing would be relations with other Hunters (not like that), but I can't do that without a group, so skippin' it! I'm also only going to scan the first page because the other ones are just ticky boxes. 

So: Greyjack looks big and buff and scary, with the heavy cloak and the hood that hides his face, but then he talks and he's got an accent that immediately identifies him as, for want of a better word, a bumpkin. So he doesn't talk much, and he's found that to be pretty reliably intimidating, especially when the earth rumbles a little or a cold breeze kicks up. He really would like to get rid of these gauntlets (I guess they must upset his tummy or something, though buggered if I can find any downside to them at first read), but the thing is if he manages to con a bad person into wearing them, then a bad person has them, and if he cons a good person into them, then he's conned a good person. Truly a conundrum.

Character Creation: Midnight Muscadines

Welp, it's not impossible that I'll make my ten characters for the month, but it's gonna be tight. Just having trouble finding time to read games in the first part of the month. Guess I'm kinda jammed up. 

The Game: Midnight Muscadines
The Publisher: Pandion Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

This game reminds in a lot of ways of The Wildsea - fantastical fantasy setting, character creation along a race/class combo axis, enough detail about how the world works that you can play it but not so much that you'd get bogged down. The gimmick here is the jam-magic. Characters have a jam-jar that creates magical jam, and the more ingredients you put in (up to four), the more complex and unique the spell gets. The system is a pretty simple "roll dice, add 'em up, beat the difficulty" sort of thing, plus cards that act as way to add bonuses and randomizer certain other things. It looks pretty cool, actually (and it's nominated for an Ennie for Best Layout & Design, so that's cool). So let's get to it!

So first we Pick a Folk. The races here are nicely weird, and there's a couple that call to me. I like the duskywhims, I like the tatterlings...let's go with those, actually. Vaguely magical, tattered clothes, wanderers not because they actually yearn to wander but because if they stay in place too long, they start to king of unravel a bit. That's pretty cool.

These guys are little, hunched, and frayed, with gleaming button eyes and long fingers. I get three Abilities: Mend the Forgotten (I can repair anything, including a relationship, for one use); Familiar with Fray (I get a bonus to navigate and hide in the Wildernight), and A Stitch of Luck (I can make someone else's item lucky so that it holds when it should break, once). Neat!

I get some character questions from my Folk, too:

I think when he feels his seams start to fray, he finds a hollow or a cave or some other cool, enclosed place where he can feel held tight by the world. The town he returned to, then, was the opposite of that - Soleau, on the Zephyrus Prairie. It's far too open for him, but the textile artisans there are some of the best in Nimm, so he's gone back to get materials and learn techniques, even though the sky is just too big there for his heart. 

I'll answer the other questions as I go, I think. Next up is Background. I'm a Marmeteer now, meaning I'm all 'bout that jam, but I was something else first. Hmm. Again, there are some great ones. Wanderlustian appeals but it seems a little on the nose. Honeywarden would let me KEEP BEES, SO THEY DON'T GET AWAY but I don't think it fits the vibe I have so far. I'm gonna go with Bramblehand and do scavenging, foraging, and alchemy type stuff. I get 6 Endurance, 1d6 Protection, Strength and Willpower are my special Attributes, and then I get two more Abilities. Murmurations of Flora (I can burn a card to forage for an ingredient of my choice, matching the suit) and Gutbrew Logic (I can make a tea based on an ingredient that's not magical, but grants a 1d6 impact die, so it's basically a little buff). 

Guilds! I'm a Marmeteer by default, and then I'm also a member of a second Guild (which then gives my last Ability). Ooh, there's a few that I really like. Storycloaks and Verdengarde are both appropriate, but I think I want a little more flavor. I'm gonna say my guy is in the Cloud Coven, so he's a witch. That gives me a Bonded Familiar. I want a Night Cat (they're native to the Wildernight, so it makes sense that a tatterling would be able to attract one). 

MOW

One of the questions up there is "what little superstition do you whisper into each stitch?", and I think the answer is "the Night Cat listens and silently remembers."

Next step is Attributes, Endurance, Protection, but I did that, didn't I? Oh, no, wait, I need to allocate dice for my Attributes, but the other two stats are fixed. Let's see now. I get d4, d4, d6, d8, but then I get to step up Strength and Willpower. Well, I think I'll put a d4 into Strength and then step it up to d6. I'll put my other d4 into Heart; I don't see my tatterling as an especially charismatic or persuasive person. I'll put the d6 into Dexterity, and the d8 into Willpower, which then steps up to d10. 

Write down Abilities, yeah, I did that. Make my jar and magic n' stuff, awesome! 

I'm meant to sketch my jar on my sheet. Erm, sure. I'll employ skills of an artist. Right, good, that's a jar, I guess. Now I need to reveal two cards to pick ingredients. 'Scuse me a moment. Nine of spades, six of hearts. That gives me...spotted mask or whispering thistle. I get to pick one of those to make a jam, and put the other ingredient in my pouch. Let's see what these do. 

Spotted mask lets me dispel illusions or see through lies. Whispering thistle lets me send a brief telepathic message to someone. Both are pretty cool, but I think I gotta go with the spotted mask. 

So, to answer another question, I think when he was in Soleau at one point, he met another tatterling named Vesu, and Vesu kinda broke his heart. He wove Vesu's story into his cloak - but here's the thing, he didn't mention her relationship to him at all. It was just Vesu's story, right up to when they met. (The fact that he made a jam that allows seeing through lies after he met Vesu is perhaps telling.)

Right, anyway, now I get one 1d6 item to my inventory. The book says I can use my imagination or "roll" on a chart, though the chart is set up for a card draw. Whatever, it's cool, we know what you meant. I'll draw a card, I think. "Whipper Willow Bow." I kinda like that, actually; if I'm out hunting the Wildernight, having a bow is probably useful. 

And finally, we do the Details. I could roll for Style and Quirk. I don't think I want to roll for Style, as I think I have a decent sense of this guy. Actually, "Shadow Whisperer" is one of the options and that's pretty much perfect, so I'ma take it. Now, for Quirk, I think I actually do want to roll. "Forgetful Nametagger." Basically my guy is really bad with names so he gives people nicknames. I really like that; he thinks of people as fabric, stitches, patterns, rather than by names, so names don't really stick with him (this might also play into his low Heart attribute). 

So the last character question is the one about the first thing I ever patched. I'm gonna say it was a hat. He was leaving Soleau, he met a rancher who was heading out into the prairie after a lost mossback but his hat had a big hole in it. My guy reached up, grabbed the hat, stitched a pat onto it, handed it back, said "Good luck, Mossbacker," and left the town. He wishes he'd never come back, because it was on his second visit that he met Vesu. 

Cool, all done but some other important details. My guy's name is Hestry, but he barely answers to it anymore. He wears the signature long cloak of a tatterling, a big, broad hat, and he lets Suvay, his Night Cat, trail behind him most of the time (Suvay is a sweetheart but she's really heavy and, like all cats, a non-Newtonian substance at room temperature). Hestry finds his attention split between being a bramblehand and foraging, scavenging, and the like, and leaning more into his witchy proclivities and reading the movements of wind and fabric. 

And that's about it. I think this would really cool to play, actually.