Raptus Regaliter

I had wanted planned on doing a wrapup of the first day of PAX this year, but it’s three in the morning, and I’m beat. If I have time, I’ll post tomorrow. At worst, I’ll do a full wrapup when I get back home.

As a side note, I did get to meet Rym and Scott briefly at round two of the Omegathon, which was cool. I’m looking forward to their panel tomorrow evening.

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I’ve got multiple gaming groups. Occasionally they merge, but some of us have more interest in particular games than others. On Fridays, a group of four of us are going to be getting together to play a real, honest to Joe Pesci Burning Wheel campaign. To that end, we’ve started building the setting over on the This Modern Death Forum, but I figured that I could write up the condensed version over here.

Just to warn y’all, this is still a work in progress. Things are still unnamed, unclear, and undeveloped. But it’s a damn good start. We’ve been referring to the game so far as Burning Deadwood, but I believe it’s gone slightly beyond that by now.

So, here’s the setting as it stands. Special thanks to Xenith, who posted this excellent summary on the forums. Also, I’d like to thank Babe and Randy, my other two players, for their contributions.

A map of the immediate area, from the Field Roden perspective

What’s the Big Picture? What’s going on in this setting that makes it ripe for adventure. What’s changing, evolving, declining?

The Dwarves have found a mineral-rich stretch of low, old mountains which they have been raping for a couple decades in secret (as those greedy little fucks do). But, given emergent technology, word traveled fast. Men came from the east in wagon-loads to fill their pockets and make a name for themselves. They are motivated by their internal clocks. They know their time on the planet is comparatively short, so they take advantage of any opportunity. A fringe group of elves settled much of the area north of the rich mountains thousands of years ago. Settled is a light term, they conquered it. They think they have a right to land and don’t like others encroaching on it. Men and Dwarves used Orc slave labor to build their cities and railroads, but cast them aside once the work was done. If the Orcs ever rally it could get messy. The Roden and Orcs occupied the land long before the Elves, but were pushed out of their land by the other races.

But the land, having been raped for as long as it has, it’s definitely not producing except for a fortunate few. The good veins have been monopolized and everyone else is just trying to squeeze in where they can. The dwarves still own most of the proven veins, but the increase in people brings many problems. Quite a few dwarves who didn’t keep up with the times lost their claims through legal trickery. They try to find support, but the lawless, unclaimed land grants them no safe harbor. Once man put his name on the paper for the claim, he protects it with might, muscle, and gun.

But man is stupid at the same time he is crafty. The vices that attract men in such towns-the alcohol, the camp women-strip them of what they gain as soon as it lands in their pocket. Elves, unhappy with the degree of land desecration, run brothels and saloons and tobacconists, trading minuscule claims for a week’s worth of dick stink between the legs of a jaded woman. Their goal is to gain enough to have sway, like being a majority stakeholder somewhere.

Dwarves have changed tunes as well. As man begins to take over their claims, they too figure out ways to put their hand in man’s pocket as he did to them. Dwarves have started working procurement trades, getting man to pass back the money he stole in the form of exuberant mark-ups on mining gear. There’s a large band of them, too, that control trade. They’re an alliance, because they found out pretty quickly they couldn’t defeat man on a mono a mono basis, and they have to band together.

Rural life is declining. “Place” is devolving from sacred to commodity. People are favoring pidgin over their native tongue. Material is valued over action. All of the worst parts of capitalism are destroying the serenity of peasant/agrarian life. True belief is declining. It has become a convenient excuse for conquest and persecution. Most people out in the frontier do little more than pay it lip service, but otherwise it has become unimportant in day-to-day lives.

There’s an entire band of settlers who came out for this very purpose. They only come into the main bits of town and such during the day, before all the philandering and drinking begins, to preach, but a few battered women and a dead preacher was all it took to realize they weren’t welcome after dark. And the women fit the cult of “true womanhood” to a T - Piety, submission, purity and domesticity. They will follow their men, they will venture in to town after dark if a father or husband asks to prove the true godlessness and sinful ways of the other settlers. They will not raise their voice to the men nor a hand to protect themselves if one should get upset, for it’s a woman’s place to be subservient and accepting of the whims of the superior men. However, to the “camp women”, they are nothing but fire and brimstone. Half the whores go to church because they want some solace. The other half go to rile the believers during service.

What’s the world’s culture? What are the cultural analogs? Analogs can be taken from historical earth, current events or fantasy works.

Dwarves - Very traditional Tolkein-esque, but tone down the merriment and up the corporate capitalist.
Orcs - Nomads. Savage beasts. Hatred with a capital H.
Roden - Farmers, peasant-folk, “Agrarian”
Humans - What *aren’t* they like? Greedy, opportunistic, technological, frantic (short life spans)
Elves - What a sad little boy you are

What’s the conflict in which the characters are involved? What are the sides? What’s wrong?

The characters have recently…ah…”stumbled” upon an unmanned claim. Orlan, the big boy of Halcyon Falls, has a significant stake in the claim and does not take kindly to the characters sitting on it.

What physical place does the conflict take place in? What’s the ecology, environment, location?

Halcyon Falls is settled in the middle of a lush valley nestled up against the craigs of the Badlands. There is a big river running about 1/2mi east of of town. The area gets really wet winters, which usually floods the river and threatens outlying houses and settlements.

What’s the name of the most important place in this setting? Not the capital or any dumb shit like that, but The Place where all the action goes down?

Halcyon Falls, the claim the characters find themselves in possession of, and the surrounding area.

What’s the name of a faraway place that folks talk about, dream about or mutter under their breath about?

Sunday City lies further yet to the west. Halcyon Falls is many people’s hope of gaining enough wealth to be able to afford that final push to Sunday City. It’s what people talk about, what people toil in the mines for, what people mutter in their sleep during their most pleasant dreams. No one’s been there, but the stories of that friend who had a friend who went and returned are enough to turn the sourest of souls, the most pessimistic of men west as the sun sets over those high, cold crags. (I believe we came up with a different name during the first session, but I cannot for the life of me remember what it was.)

Who are the antagonists? Who is opposing the goals of the characters?

Orlan, the big bad businessman in town.

The next two questions don’t have answers yet:
Imagine all of the characters are standing in a room/ruin/field with the antagonists or their minions. What do the antagonists want from that meeting? What do the character want from that meeting? That’s where your game begins.

Alternately, imagine the characters standing at the scene of some great disaster or calamity clearly caused by one of the antagonists. What’s the disaster? How did it happen? What are the characters going to do about it right now?

What type of magic exists in this world? Pick one or two of the magic systems: Faith (and Blasphemous Hatred), Sorcery (and Abstraction), Natural Magic, Spirit Binding, Summoning, or Enchanting.

Sorcery still exists, but is falling behind the surge of technology in the eyes of man. The other races, moving slower as a result of their different lifespans, still rely heavily on magic. Elves with their spell songs, dwarves with their arts, and orcs with their blasphemous chants.

Faith is powerful, but failing. Other races have their own versions of Faith…the Immortal Elves with their wearisome Grief, the Dwarves and their endless Greed, and the Orcs, with the deep and boundless Hatred.

Some of this may change when the Magic Burner is available.

If Sorcery is used, what’s its idiom? Does it require speech? Gestures?
Sorcery requires speech, and then gestures are a character idiom. Some sorcerers use them, some don’t.

If Sorcery is used, what spells are available? Which spells are inappropriate to the game world?
So far, all spells are available for use.

If is Faith used, what is the Faith idiom? What are the religions? Is Faith universal or does it only affect believers?
There are two major gods worshipped: Zoltec, the Sun and Turkis, the Earth. The names came from older cultures, but have managed to stick around. Many people just refer to them as The Sun or The Earth, so phrases such as “Sunblessed” and “The Earth take you!” are fairly common. As mentioned, most of the common folk simply pay lip-service to the gods. Some of the zealots claim miracles, but, as is common for that sort of thing, the doubters tend to see them simply as happy coincidences.

What character stocks are in play in this world? Which are restricted and why?
Men, Dwarves, Elves, Orcs, and Roden. Possibly Great Wolves at some time in the future.

What Cultural Traits apply to the characters of this game world? Pick three Character Traits for each culture.
Intrepid, Risk-taker and Cocksure for Men. The other stocks get their standard Common Traits.

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We finished up the city creation playtest last night, and it’s a friggin’ blast. The same player who wrote up the first chunk of material is working on a more detailed writeup, but I thought that I’d give y’all my initial thoughts.

The entire process of city creation for the Dresden Files RPG is fun, especially coming up with the locations. It really makes the players want to play in the city and explore all the cool stuff they’ve come up with. One of the best parts, as far as I’m concerned, is coming up with the characters that inhabit the locations. Since the players invent them, the players care about them, so any time a bad thing happens to them, the PC’s are going to jump to the rescue.

On the other hand, we found that, if you go overboard with the ideas at the beginning, you’ll bind yourself up at the end, when everybody starts tossing out story hooks and whatnot. This was the problem that we ran into - we created slightly more that twice the number of locations that were  recommended - 9 locations between 4 players - which really made the last few steps of the city creation process redundant. You’ll see what I mean when we get the full writeup posted.

Still, overall, the city creation rules are solid enough to make me and all my players incredibly excited to play the DFRPG. It’ll be fun to see what comes out of Portland, OR in the Dresdenverse.

The rumor is that we should be seeing a chapter on conflicts next, but that probably won’t happen until after GenCon, since all of the Evil Hat guys are there and will be incredibly busy. In the meantime, though, my groups have a Shadowrun game to finish, a Burning Wheel game to start, and a Werewolf: The Forsaken game to create a character for. Also, we’ll be doing some collaborative stuff (and hanging out) with the folks from Good Omens again, which is always a blast. Not to mention the monthly one-shots that we play

So, despite the slow progress of the Dresden playtesting, there’s still an awful lot of awesome gaming to talk about, so stay tuned.

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One of the members of our group was kind enough to take the mass of 3×5 index cards that we used to build our Dresdenverse Portland and post the bare bones of our creation session. There isn’t any flavor text added, but all of the Aspects, themes, locations, an personalities are there, or at least the seeds of them. As soon as we have some flavor to add - possibly tomorrow, since we’re finishing up the last couple of steps tonight. In any case, enjoy the rough sketch of Portland, OR.

If you’re interested, you can go and join in the conversation about our Dresden playtest on the This Modern Death forum.

Portland, OR

Aspects:
1. Hard to Drive, Easy to Walk
2. This is Really Two Cities
3. Two Big Rivers

Locations
1. Powell’s World of Books - Giant Bookstore
2. Portlandia - Bronze Statue
3. 40 Mile Loop - Giant Magical Circle
4. Olympus Mons Coffee Co. - Wizard Hangout
5. Rose Garden
6. Oregon State Zoo
7. The Woods - New Money Neighborhood
8. Industrial District - Vampire Territory
9. Oldtown - Downtown Portland

Location Details
1. Powell’s World of Books
Theme: Knowledge for Sale

Aspect: We got that somewhere…

Face: Worldly Archivist - Abernathy “Abby”, human cardfile, female, magical housecat.

Touch of Magic: The Magenta Room, hidden room with arcane knowledge

2. Portlandia
Theme: The Power of Icons

Aspect: The Spirit of Portland

Face: Nobody specific, but there is usually some kind of city employee or other nearby that feels the need to protect the statue from “vandals”.

Touch of Magic: The statue has no real magic itself, but it has power as the symbol of Faith in the city.

3. 40 Mile Loop
Theme: Protection Circle

Aspect: The Circle is Broken

Touch of Magic: It’s a Big Fucking Magic Circle

4. Olympus Mons Coffe Co.
Theme: Wizards’ Hangout & Haven

Aspect: It’s Hot Chocolate on a Cold Day

Face: Francesca “Frankie” Matinopalous, Tall Amazon looking woman, lots of tattoos, Suicide Girl, Master Roaster (all machines in the coffee shop are low tech, hand crafted affairs).

Touch of Magic: Incidentally arranged and equipped in a way to make it a haven for wizards. Somewhat New-Agey.

5. Rose Garden
Theme: True Romance/Date Spot

Aspect: Love and Lust

Face: Cantankerous Head Gardener, Arnold, Old Blood (family has been in Portland since the city was founded), powerful wizard, caretaker & protector (maintains the balance of energies in the Rose Garden), crafty

Touch of Magic: Attractive to the Fae (they want to take control of it). Site of Power from Life and Emotion.

6. Oregon State Zoo
Theme: False Sense of Security

Aspect: I Think This’ll Hold It

Face: Comically Exuberant Zoologist, Haresh Patil (NOT Harry!), biology grad student, uber-skeptic

Touch of Magic: Huge brass containment circle set in the center of a big fountain in the middle of the zoo.

7. The Woods
Theme: Rich New Money Neighborhood on the River

Aspect: Old Land, New Money

Face: Passive Aggressive Homeowners’ Association Chairperson, a total fucking bitch, but perky and “friendly” about it, knows who should and shouldn’t be in The Woods, has a dirty little secret

Touch of Magic: Magically Sterile

8. Industrial District
Theme: Seedy Underbelly

Aspect: Deadly After Dark

Face: Black Court Vampire Union Boss, Jeff “Benny” Benjamin (True Name - White Feather) Native American, predates the American Colonies, controls the Black Court in Portland.

Touch of Magic: Black Court Union

9. Oldtown
Theme: Heart of the City

Aspect: Livingroom of Portland

Face: Old Blues musician street performer, notices everything that goes on in his town, full of anectdotes, he gots the blues

Touch of Magic: Mostly mundane, has access to the Shanghai Tunnels

Who Cares?

Black Court Vampires
White Council, especially Arnold
The Fae, they want the Rose Garden
The Sasquatch, U’Bi’K, HATES White Feather
Coroporate America
The PC’s

Who Keeps the Peace?

The PC’s
The Cops
Sasquatch
The White Council
The Fae

How Do Mortals Cope?

An inneffective group of Wiccans
An underfunded Police precinct

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We started working on the city creation rules for the Dresden Files RPG last night. When it gets done, I’ll be sure to post it here, for everyone to see. Let me just say that the entire process is immensely fun, although somewhat time consuming. I have a feeling that, in practice, writing up a city will take pretty much an entire game session and character creation will likely take a whole nother session. On the other hand, withe the Fate system, creating both the city and the characters will most likely be like small games in and of themselves. I really enjoy the collaborative nature of the DFRPG city creation. As a consumately lazy GM, anything I don’t have to make up makes me happy.

During our playtesting session last night, we decided that we’d write up the Dresdenverse version of Portland, OR. So far, it’s a city of incidental magic - a perfect storm of history, custom, and intentional wizardry creating a fantastically interesting location.

Expect a full write-up soon, most likely cross-posted over at the This Modern Death Forums. I can assure you it will be fascinating. And the effect on player ownership of the setting will be awesome. I have some very high hopes for the Dresden RPG.

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So, my group played SotC as a one-shot last night. Rather than going for the standard pulp adventure feel, we did sort of a steampunk/pulp mix. The year was 1857 - during the Indian Revolt - and instead of having fought in the Great War, everyone was a former member of the now-defunct East India Company.

The intended plot was fairly simple. The H.M.S. Balthazar, a ship carrying tea and spices and other sundries from India to London is attacked by mysterious turbaned pirates during the night. The characters are awakened from their bunks, and run to defend the ship. After warding off the pirate attack, they find that a couple of clay tablets - the Tablets of Brama - have gone missing! This leads to an investigation upon their return to England, during which they discover that the Tablets were supposed to go to one Dr. Bartholomew Farnham, a Professor of Antiquities at the British Museum.

Dr. Farnhan is reputed to be working on some secret project for the Crown, and hasn’t been seen for some time. Investigating his office at the British Museum, they find one of the turbaned pirates rifling through the good Doctor’s belongings. When they chase down and capture the mysterious man, he crumbles to dust, but leaves behind a page from Dr. Farnham’s notes - a rubbing of a chunk of the Tablets, and the address to a warehouse on the banks of the Thames. Some research into the rubbing indicates that the Tablets of Brama, which, legend says had the power to end wars, were in fact an ancient blueprint, but a blueprint for what was unknown.

Making their way to the warehouse, they find hundreds of the strange pirates loading steam-powered boats with supplies. Dr. Farnham is there as well, bound and held captive. The characters go in guns blazing and fists swinging, causing massive chaos, and setting off some of the crates of gunpowder. After a vicious fight, Dr. Farnham is rescued.

He informs the characters that he was captured  by the real mastermind of the operation, one Sir Randall Dalton, former Leftenant in the East India Company*. It seems that he was unwilling to let the dissolution of the Company go, and was convinced that if he built the weapon, he could crush the Indian Rebellion and once again restore the East India Company as the rulers of India. Capturing the Tablets (actually, the remaining tablets) also allowed him to control their ancient guardians, who, through some strange Eastern magic, were undead slaves to whomever held them.

So, the characters track Sir Dalton to a small, rocky island off of Britain’s northeastern coast. They can plainly see the pirate ship that attacked them in the first scene. The island itself is dominated by a crumbling keep. Sneaking onto the island, they make it to the underground workshop where Dalton has finally completed the weapon - and modified it for his own purposes! During the ensuing battle, Dalton activates his monstrosity - a giant iron clockwork and steam powered elephant, armed with very large guns. Of course, the characters defeat it, and bring the keep down on Dalton and his mechanical monstrosity. As the keep crumbles, the characters make a dashing escape back to England.

Now, in practice, we didn’t make it all the way through. They managed to stop Dalton immediately after the scene in the warehouse. I do, however, really like this scenario, and I might use it for convention play at some point.

Some changes I’d make:

• The characters shoudn’t start off on the ship. If the players do well enough, they can prevent the theft of the Tablets and pretty much blow the game out of the water (no pun intended). Instead, they should be handed the assignment of investigating the attack of the H.M.S. Balthazar, and find out about the Tablets later.
• Use the quick character creation rules. Or, better yet, use pregenerated characters. For a convention, I’ll probably use variations of the characters that were created by my group. I really liked their ideas
• Really shave down the amount of investigation that the group needs to do. As awesome as it can be, if not done right, or if the players have no clear idea of what they’re after, it can take far too long and lead to serious tangents.
• I need to prep better. The minions are easy (SotC’s minion rules rock!), but I need to really work on my NPC’s.
• Finally, I need more steampunkish stuff. Maybe Dalton’s ship needs to be a dirigible. Even better, he may need a good henchman to foil the characters.

Despite the problems, the system itself is a joy to run - incredibly intuitive. I had some difficulty (by some I mean a lot) compelling one of my players’ Aspects. I’ll chalk this one up to poor communication of the rules on my part. Still, all in all I think everyone had a good time. Running this game was great practice for the Dresden Files playtest that we’re starting tonight.

*I don’t know if there actually were Leftenants in the East India Company. But it made for a decent plot, so fuck it.

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