Showing posts with label Dan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dan. Show all posts

Monday, 3 June 2013

Gaming Icebreakers

May was great for gaming and having fun. Less good for fitness and Blogging. This month I am back on track for exercising and dieting again. I am currently back up to 14st 8lbs but I expect that to fall off pretty quickly. I intend to be 14st or lighter by the end of June.

I had a pretty full weekend of Gaming. On Friday we played a 10th level Pathfinder one shot, That I can’t talk too much about as Gav wants to run it again for another group. (Which I will try and get him to write a guest post about).

On Saturday we played Mark’s Golden Age of Pirates D20 Game, which was excellent. We explored a Dungeon on an Island revealed by the tide but had a hard real time limit of the returning tide that threatened to drown us. It added an excellent level of tension to the adventure.

Then on Sunday we played the final part of Dan’s Savage Worlds of Slain adventure (Beyond the Wailing Marsh from Issue 16 of Signs and Portents Magazine). In which we cured two tribes of a ravaging disease and defeated the forces of the Drune Lords in a mass battle.

On saturday evening because we had so many different people staying or visiting for Gaming we had a BBQ which led to some extremely interesting conversations about peoples experiences with Gaming. Gav asked the first question, which was very similar to the one Keith asked us as an Icebreaker when he was doing Have Dice Will Travel.

He asked each of us “What is your favorite system?” and got some extreamly varied responses;
Mine is Feng Shui, but others that were mentioned were 13th Age, Apocalypse World, Dnd 3.X, Mage: The Ascencion, FATE (specifically Spirit of the Century), and Call of Cthulhu.

This led to a variety of other questions from What was your favorite Campaign, Favorite Character, Favorite Adventure? to what is an example of the worst behaviour you have experienced at a Game? If you don’t GM, Why not? (Leading to me lending someone The Armitage Files, which I hope they will run.) What is your Favorite XP system?

What would you ask as a gaming Icebreaker? What is your answer to any of the Questions above?

Tuesday, 23 April 2013

Stocking Fleurs Temple and 13th age session Write up.

So having made this map out of my dwarven forge, I used it for a 13th Age game on Saturday evening.



 This is what I stocked it with combined with a session summary:


The players were asked to travel to Fleur’s Temple to retrieve an Idol of the dark god of the huntsman by See’s Far Ahead a Druid in the Service of the High Druid who often takes the form of a Giant Owl.

I used the opening Icon relation ship rolls to figure out who wanted them to go on the mission and made Grimness (played by K8) who had a 6 with the High Druid to define her contact in The High Druid’s organisation. That done they set off for the mesa.

In the entrance room they found a trio of Angry Rangers (I used Gnoll Rangers with changed racial traits) and a band of Human Thugs hiding in the long left hand room. After a brief and unfortunately unsuccessful attempt to Bluff their way past them a fight ensued.

Victorious, the players discovered that the the small left room was a storeroom. In which the player found a variety of Potions, Oils and Runes. (I used the table in the 13th Age book for non cash rewards)

Up the stairs to the right was a strange broken Elven Oracular Device that the Followers of Fleur used to get information about their targets. Despite being broken it answered one question for each player after fresh blood was poured upon it. I gave them a freebie question from a 5 with the Elf Queen and had the device lie on a roll of 5 or less on a d20. The first question they asked was how to fix it and they promptly fed it blood from the recently slain Rangers granting the rest of the party a question each.

The next room contained two statues in alcoves on either wall. the left hand Statue depicted Fleur as a Dark Elf holding an unloaded crossbow, while the right hand showed him as a Wood Elf with an unloaded bow. Each alcove was carved like the environment each type of elf would hunt in.

A careful examination revealed that each statue stood on a pressure plate, in the carvings were  hidden small holes and each statue had loose Arrows or Bolts in carved quivers. Careful use of the Mage Hand Cantrip loaded each weapon and set of the trap firing darts out of the alcoves. Once both weapons were loaded a third alcove was revealed in the third wall showing a High Elven Depiction of Fleur. Another careful use of Mage hand placed a wand from it’s carved holster into the hand of the statue and revealed the Idol and it’s Guardian.

A Displacer Beast. I used the tables in the 13th age book and the ideas from the 4th ed version of the monster to make it.

Displacer Beast
Large 4th level Monster.
+11 Initiative
AC 20 (natural odd rolls miss Displacer Beasts) PD18 MD 14
HP 108
2x tentacle attacks +9 hit:14 damage
“Where the hell is it?” Once per turn; If you miss a displacer beast it can pop free and make a free tentacle attack.

Moving the Idol also caused the traps to go off again catching the players near the alcoves. Once they had the Idol and had defeated the Beast I let them retrieve the magical ammo and Wand from the Statues. They received a Wand of Aegis form the 13th age core book. 2 Arrows of Slaying and a Keen Bolt.

By the time they had finished off the beast it was beginning to get late so I slightly rushed the rest of the dungeon. If I had more time I would have filled the section hidden by Secret Doors in the southeast part of the map with Giant Spiders.

As it was I asked what the players who had unused Icon Rolls would like to find in the rest of the dungeon. Dead bodies with plot hooks were suggested so I made the south most room a cell with 2 bodies inside. On the bodies they found a torc suggesting a link to the High Druid and a Book of paintings about Ley Lines.

Then as they headed for the exit I used one of the players outstanding relationship rolls a 5 conflicted with The Emperor. I had a squad of imperial Dragon knights turn up reveal that the Idol could be used to  unleash the Wild Hunt and therefore they needed to take it into custody. K8 then asked if should step outside and made crude hooting noises. She cashed in her 6 with the High Druid and got carried off by a Giant Owl.

The rest of the part looked sheepishly at the Dragon Knights until Ash (played by Dan) piped up that he had a 5 left with the Prince of Shadows and revealed the receipt for “One Fake Idol” Signed by the Prince of Shadows that had fallen off the Idol when it was put into Grimness’ Bag.

We finished the session in a great place with a host of plot hooks dangling to make more adventures out of.

Where is the Real Idol?
What is with the book of Ley Line paintings?
Who was the dead Druid?
How will the players meet up with Grimness?

Thursday, 4 April 2013

Weekend of Gaming

I had an extremely pleasant weekend Relaxing and playing games.

Gav gave me a copy of his new book, full review to follow. Age of Scorpio I am currently about half way through it and it is excellent.

As Saturday was #Tabletopday we played Hordes and had an ace 4 player game.

Then in the evening I ran Day After Ragnarok (a game that you should look at just because of this map) Over dinner I got each of the players to text me something they wanted to see in the adventure.



I got: Iranian Car bombing, Antartic expedition and Fighting Nazi’s/Occultists in a Norweigen Fjord.

So I started my Adventure in Tehran with the players escorting a German Mystic/Scientist who was defecting to the Commonwealth. I blew up the front car in the convoy and then started a massive combat scene with A Giant Snake an Angry Mob and lots of disguised German troops.

Several Grenades a Satchel bomb and a short chase scene later the players followed clues leading them to a secret German U-Boat base in Norway (unsurprisingly in a Fjord) Where they infiltrated the base, set explosives and unleashed a massive Wolf creature frozen in Ice.

All in all the session was brilliant.    

We also played the first Achtung Cthulhu Scenario (Their kickstarter just finished but you can still last moment pledge if you want) Dan ran that session and we bungled through the mission with quite a diverse and unfocused skill set.

Finally on Monday Gav and I played Warmachine over a board made of my Dwarven Forge which looked Epic.


All in all it was an awesome weekend.

What did you get up to?

Thursday, 20 September 2012

Lyrium Dreams and Diet update

This week I weigh 13st 7lbs. I have stayed pretty stable since my binge day this week largely due to conceding 2 forfeit points to Ant  both points were due to Devouring Birthday cake. The first was a banana bread I baked for John’s Birthday which we celebrated on tuesday at out 13th Age  Game and then Thursday cake was brought into work for someones Birthday which tempted me once more.

Friday we have the 2nd session of Lyrium Dreams a Savage Worlds Game that Dan is running as I have stated learning Chen Tai Chi again on a friday from 7 until 8. Dan has also just started the Rise of the Runelords Campaign in pathfinder for his Monday night Game so wanted a prep light game. Given the ease of the Savage worlds system he decided to go with a collaborative freeform style of Game and Setting Generation.

This was his Zen like pitch:

In a Taoist style my pitch is no pitch... allow me to explain-

I suggest Savage Worlds - based on a theme document (borrowed from "Mortal Coil") and relationship map (borrowed from "Smallville").  Other than the system the game is a completely blank slate -- we'll play whatever setting and style we decide as a group (though Savage Worlds supported action more than introspection).  If you want to play modern gritty noir horror - fine, High fantasy - sure, east-end gangsters vs the russian mafia - ok, space pirate and anthropomorphic animal ninja - why not! as long as there's group consensus - and we're all on the same page.  We will need to agree on a strong central premise and several points of conflict (otherwise there'll be no stories)

Because of how open this will be, much of the narrative control will be in the hands of the players, and I'll also be GMing in a light-touch improv style (I expect the players to contribute heavily to the setting and to the story - especially if it's something completely out-there for which I have no terms of reference - you'll have to explain how a steam-powered mech armour works and what a the view is like from a hover skiff on the ice lakes of Pluto).

The game will run more smoothly if you bear the following hints in mind...:

Short guide to Improv at the RPG table-

Don't try to be too clever -- If your character goes into a bar for the first time, they should probably order a drink, they probably wouldn't do a backflip over the bar and shoot the pianist. If you do this kind of thing, you risk spoiling the narrative by doing things for which the other players can't see the justification. Characters should act in character and do what's natural for them to do. You'll find that acting naturally helps the game along much better because the other players will come to know what to expect from your character.  It's easier for the other players to build on your ideas if they fit the expectation of the characters and setting.

Don't block-- This follows on from the first technique. You won't be able to understand what the other characters are like if you try to block everything they do. So if a character proposes going into a bar, you probably shouldn't say “It's closed” or “I don't go in bars”. It's fine to say, “Well, I wouldn't usually, but just this once”. In fact this is very good because this reveals something about your character as well as encouraging the other player's development of the game.

Reincorporate -- Build on what's already happened. If an NPC is mentioned by name in an early scene, bring them back later on. If a detail is mentioned, make it appear in a later scene under a different light, make it more or less important than it was. The reason behind reincorporation is because it reinforces the narrative by drawing attention to the salient points.

Amended from Steve Dempsey's "Improvising with GUMSHOE " http://www.pelgranepress.com/seepagexx/December2007-Steve.html
For a much more detailed examination of Improv in RPGs I recommend Graham Walmsley's "Play Unsafe" http://www.lulu.com/shop/graham-walmsley/play-unsafe/ebook/product-17526794.html  (There is also a 20% Voucher on all orders from Lulu available until the 7th Sept.  Code: CITHARA20)

And the setting we ended up with was:

Tone: Swashbucklery

Setting: Spelljammer, High Fantasy in Space!

Situation: Sailing around on a lost tech ship, doing scoundrel type things.

Other key phrases include, 50 fathoms in space and both Farscape and Firefly.

Living Dungeon Asteroides (stolen from 13th age) full of Lyrium (Stolen from Dragon Age) (the element that makes magic happen) flying towards populated worlds, we go in and kill the dungeon before it can hit the worlds.

Villains:
Everyone brings at least one person or thing to the relationship map
things that will turn up on the relationship map are:
The owner of our awesome lost tech ship
Whoever is shooting the asteroids at us
Some sort of evil space Empire possibly made up of monsters
a “Foil” who might or might not be on our side each adventure (this ended up being the dragonborn Tiamat (Female) and Bahumat (Male) see relationship map for more info.
“Templars”

and this was our Relationship Diagram:



Here is a link to our player doc for it:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NtnM7phjjP8cU5stpgjnXotyQ8N32CebxHol5fP_OOU/edit

The 2nd session is Tomorrow evening and it looks like it is going to be great.

What are you playing this weekend?