Blades of Glory (Game Session Report)

Our Monday Night Gaming Group was back in action this past Monday, after a month off. We were again hounded by technical difficulties that threatened to TPK the session, but switching to Roll20 redeemed the evening.(1)

Our cast of characters currently serve as mercenaries who have been assigned the task of raiding Scanadian manors. We started the session by dropping off a group of refugees that we had escorted back to our camp. We also had to deposit our haul of coins and such. We were then going to head back out into Scanadian territory, but we were delayed by the disappearance of one of our henchmen, Bob. Given that he is only a human, my character (Delvin, a dwarf) was content to leave him behind but the others in the group felt compelled to search for him.

After checking with the local tavern and finding out that he was last seen in the company of lady of the evening, I was again ready to leave him to his fate (stupid humans are worse than rabbits) but again the group continued the search. Our tracker guy followed Bob and his companion's tracks out into the woods where it was obvious that they were intending to engage in a business transaction. We found the where they did the nasty (ewww) and then discovered a serious of insect/arachnid tracks all around. No humans but lots of giant creepy-crawly tracks. Truly a case of being caught with your pants down.

My lack of enthusiasm for risking my precious dwarven flesh to save these two humans was overcome by the joy of brandishing my battle axe against spiders. Delvin is at his best when he is moving forward and going all in with his axe blade.(2)

Notes:
(1) We have been struggling with fatal instabilities with Fantasy Grounds. The funny thing is that I (Delvin) always asks for a weather update at the beginning of the day, an inside joke that goes back to our GM (Rob) and his love of Harn weather charts. However, my last two weather queries are being blamed for our technical difficulties (as evidenced by this post and this post).

(2) I am thoroughly enjoying my first experience with GURPS. While there are lots of fiddly bits, the overall mechanics are very simple and I like the options we have as players both in character creation and as our characters are in action.

Monday Moodsetter 3

Ayutaya, Thailand

RPG Rorschach: What is the first gaming thought that pops into your head?

Adventures in the Unnamed City 3: Restrictions & Limitations

Pic by Alan Lee

One of the draws of a medieval urban fantasy campaign is the potential for a very different approach to gaming than the usual wilderness and dungeon setting. In the typical dungeon or wilderness, players are typically limited only by character ability and by resources. Fireball a cave full of trolls? Sure, if you have the ability to do it, then go for it. There are usually no legal or social consequences for toasting up some trolls. You may wish you had the spell when you meet the army of giants ten minutes later, but that is a resource consideration. Legal and social considerations matter little deep underground.

In an urban setting, player characters are not so much restricted by resources as they are by other factors. Unlike the remote wilderness, legal and social consequences loom large in a typical city. For example, if I am use Constantinople as my historical foundation for the campaign setting, there are a couple of legal items that are big deals:

• Most Forms of Magic Are Highly Illegal
• Being Armed and/or Armored Is Illegal for Most People

This urban setting creates a very different set of circumstances than the troll-infested cave under the mountain. Imagine the consequences of tossing a 10d6 fireball into a crowded market to kill of a couple of thugs near the basket weaver's booth. The characters would be pursued to the ends of the earth in the name of justice.

To be clear here, I am not trying to do a historical simulation as I create my setting, so I do not feel bound by these two provisions. However, the idea of keeping some of these restrictions and watching how the players work around it might end up being one of the best aspects of the setting.

I can really see how this would work well with the system like GURPS. There might be a premium on unarmed combat, stealth, social skills, creative spell selection/use, and socio-economic status. Reputation and connections become critically important even as the importance of a shiny suit of armor fades into the background.

I think the challenge is in the implementation. I do plan to keep the setting as simple as possible, particularly at the start of the campaign. I also think it would be great to have the players participate in the creation of the setting. This assumes that they are interested, but that is a topic for another post.

Five For Friday 2: A Modern Literary Appendix N

Here are five books that I have influenced how I think about gaming that fall outside of the sci-fi and fantasy genres (with the possible exception of Bones of the Moon, which could be shelved with the fantasy books at your local bookstore).

• Bones of the Moon (by Jonathan Carroll): A whimsical dreamworld gradually turns creepy (a Carroll hallmark). I discovered Jonathan Corroll through his first novel, Land of Laughs.
• The Historian (by Elizabeth Kostova): This is one of my all-time favorite novels, right up there with The Name of the Rose and To Kill a Mockingbird. Creepy turns to horror in this historically detailed literary suspense novel. I read it one sitting...at 720 pages, it was a bit of a sit for me.
• The Lock Artist (by Steve Hamilton): An award-winning suspense novel that will have you rethinking your lockpicking characters. A plus for me is that much of the action takes place in Milford, Michigan, one of the places where the teen-aged Rusty Battle Axe used to hang out.
• The Night Circus (by Erin Morgenstern): A dark, dreamy, and evocative tale of magic and romance, set in western Europe and North America (c. 1900) that has me rethinking all sorts of gaming things.
• The Shadow of the Wind (by Carlos Ruiz Zafón): A dark literary suspense novel, set in post-WW2 Barcelona. I was able to sleep soundly until I finished the book.

Adventures in the Unnamed City 2

Astute readers will note that the title of this post reads "in the Unnamed City" rather than "in an Unnamed City" (in my last post, I used an, not the). I decided that that city for my in-the-works medieval urban fantasy campaign setting does not have a name. The city did have a name long ago, but then it was Unnamed. How and when and why that happened, no one can say. These are questions that are best left unasked and unanswered.

Image source: http://www.scenicreflections.com/files/DIVE_INTO_FANTASY_CITY_Wallpaper_70tj3.jpg

Adventures in an Unnamed City 1

So I have started my working on my urban fantasy campaign setting in earnest (wherever earnest may be). It feels a bit daunting, but deciding to use Constantinople (c. 1150) as my point of departure helps considerably. I have a decent collection of books on Byzantium, plus I just picked up the GURPS PDF on Constantinople. Starting with Constantinople has at least moved me out of the starting blocks.

My original thought was to use Constantinople juiced up with a bit of magic and weirdness. While I still might do that, I am now thinking of creating a fictional city with a lot of elements lifted from Constantinople. I am also thinking that I want a setting that I can use with multiple rule sets--GURPS, FATE, and Swords & Wizardry--so for now I am mainly thinking about setting and not system.

What has worked well when you have run a medieval urban fantasy RPG setting?

2013 Gaming Goals Intentions

Goals for gaming seems a bit grandiose to me, and also a bit of a fun-kill. It is not like I will keep score. So these are nothing more than my gaming intentions-at-the-current-moment. Here are my three gaming intentions for 2013:

1. Run a GURPS campaign. It would be my first attempt at running GURPS. The Monday Night Gaming Gang would likely be the victims.
2. Run a FATE campaign. This, too, would be my first attempt at FATE. I am hoping to get our scattered in-house-face-to-face group together for some seasons. It is tough when half the group are college students, although the parent half of the group could threaten to withhold funds to get them to all come home on the same weekend once a month.
3. Create an medieval urban fantasy campaign setting I can be run with GURPS (see #1 above), FATE (see #2 above), or an OSR d20 game (probably Swords & Wizardry).

What are your gaming intentions for 2013?