Paper and Dice

Art demands Art

2008-07-19T13:53:00.000-07:00

This was originally posted under a pen-name blog of mine, some while ago. Due to my artist recently creating something based on this work, I'm reposting it here.

I can't emphasize how well she captured Sinclair.

There were only three ways to survive Between, according to Sinclair. You had the strength to take what you needed, you were smart enough to get what you needed, or you always had what others needed. Sinclair took it one step further; s/he made certain others had needs.

In the Between, Sinclair's fingertips were a number of unconnected hovels, husks that emulated the lost souls who always came back to them, again and again; wreckage, broken architecture, a smashed and featureless facade hiding the gaudy velvet synesthesia of whatever mad dreams and fancies lolled senseless within. Sinclair had many customers, some who served, and some of whom never actually left.

Today, Sinclair was predominantly female, with a lean, arrogant face. Heavy auburn hair hung around it like banyan vines, twisted into braids, and writhing out from them were snake-skeleton tattoos, sunning themselves across bare, pale shoulders, tails hidden at the nape. Full lips were touched with dark gloss, pressed into a regal pout, and a pair of silver rings stitched the bottom lip. The body was slender and efficient, Sinclair's preference, with the sort of impossible proportions that drew the eye of man and woman both. No matter what flesh Sinclair was wearing, the eyes were always the same; blue and cold, like arctic sky, poisonous as mercury.

Those who knew Sinclair understood that it was not inattention that kept those eyes unfocused, always seeming to slide away from things in their view. These eyes were fixed on a lanky man of sinew and bone, wrapped in Betweener rags, who was pleading for clemency. It was accounting day, when Sinclair collected what was due. Unlike the Horse Trader, another of the great merchants Between, Sinclair loved debt, and adored drawing business out over months and years.

To one side stood Emily, Sinclair's accountant, dapper and autistic, a prodigy of numbers that Sinclair had bought from the King of Fools a while back. She murmured the man's accounts over and over in her small, reedy voice, which always made Sinclair think of a very small violin. Two others indebted to Sinclair kept the man penned, two very loyal sheepdogs who craved disobedience from their flock. Neither had the wits or will to break Sinclair's hold on them, but they were happy with their job, and that was as Sinclair preferred. A few others looked on, mostly those also in debt. Walter, a slender fair-haired man with uncommonly long fingers and an excellent kinesthetic sense, occupied space next to Sinclair, carefully holding a couple of kittens, who fussed incessantly.

"You don't have anything more to trade," Sinclair announced softly. "You come here and plead to me."

The man was still reaching forward, as if he were drowning and Sinclair might save him. "I can't dream anymore!"

"That's because your dreams are on lease. I keep them in a very lovely silk and silver Faberge egg near my bedside," Sinclair said. "My books aren't even; you'll have to give something... come forward, and let me see your hand."

The two sheepdogs were very disappointed that the man didn't even hesitate. Sinclair made a mental note to punish them on general principle for not being polite; there was too much brutal eagerness showing. When the man reached out a hand, Sinclair took it, running long fingers over it, cool as snakeskin. To Sinclair's flesh, the flesh of another was a book. Reading deeper than veins and muscle and bone, Sinclair deciphered the riddles and metaphors of blood and nerve, rewriting some of what was found there, rearranging the patterns of body chemistry.

Looking at the man, Sinclair smiled, and offered a hand, palm open.

The man knew what this was, and there was a flicker of reluctance, and fear, but he knew there was no choice.

Sinclair hated leaving people choices. They should just do as they were supposed to. And this one did; he licked the palm. Almost immediately, he seized up, made a startled manikin, and fell to the floor, twitching slightly. Sinclair tilted a glance at Walter.

"Walter, sweetheart, go ahead and let the children play."

Walter, smiling softly at being noticed, walked over to the man, and set the kittens down. The little creatures immediately started clawing and biting, tugging and bounding about the immobile body. Walter patted them fondly and then moved back to his place near Sinclair. Sinclair silently hushed Emily, and then looked at the line of debtors. This happened almost every time, and it was never tiring to watch their faces.

"This man can feel everything that is happening to him," Sinclair told their hungry faces. "He will not die, unless I let him, but he'll be spending the rest of the day under the happy needlepoint attention of kittens. Each hour, I shall have dear Walter add two more kittens, until there are twenty. And they won't tire of him; I made certain of that. Now, this man is short but one day in his dues. Some of you, Emily tells me, are short far more than that this month. Consider that I have a sense of proportion. Consider this, and consider something to offer me when I call you here next. Those who have nothing may leave for now. The worthy may stay, and offer what they will."

And just as always, many of the hollow-eyed clients slithered out, fearful, addled in their need for Sinclair, and what Sinclair had for them. And just as always, Sinclair knew that some would now offer up far more than they would have. They had heard the stories of Sinclair's other methods, the penchant for thieving the body of another even while they were still using it, the horrible intrusion of Sinclair's body into their own.

They crept forward, careful.

Emily began the next page of debts, and Sinclair whispered to her to tally up payments, fixing eyes on the kittens, who gnawed and pricked the paralyzed man's hand raw, content and simple in their cruelty.

Little darlings, thought Sinclair, and smiled.

The Flavor of Machinery

2008-07-12T10:24:00.000-07:00

While combing through the 4ed Monster Manual the other day, I came to a sudden realization.

I didn't recall seeing a single monster who, outside of basic skills, had any special ability outside of combat applications.

I did a second look-thru, and though a very, very few exceptions exist, the monsters in the book are nothing but blocks of combat stats. Even in the case of the exceptions, there are barely any indications as to how these abilities are used except in combat situations.

Before I continue, I want to be sure people don't consider this observation a complaint on my part. This is the flavor of 4ed; it is a combat game, and emphasizes combat more than 3.5 by quite a bit. So, it is what it is. However, I think that the significance of this mechanical foundation is being overlooked by a good number of people.

When you build a conflict resolution mechanic for a game, it will influence the overall feel of the game. It doesn't matter how well you story-tell around the mechanics of a system; one way or the other, the mechanic will affect the mood and the tone. Further, what gets delineated mechanically and how will certainly affect how people build their characters, and therefore influence how the characters behave during the course of the game.

In Kult, for example, the system makes combat very dangerous. There is no heroic dodging of bullets in this game; if someone pulls a gun, you take cover, because it doesn't matter how tough you are. By the rules of the game, any slob with a gun can kill you with one bullet. This mechanical emphasis on how fragile a character is enhances the claustrophobia and paranoia of the setting overall. Also, for practical reasons, it influences people to keep their characters out of combat.

Another fine example is Riddle of Steel, where things which are important to your character actually enhance your performance in the game system. This provides a mechanical reward to players who pursue their character's passions and agendas, and also allows them to communicate to the GM in no uncertain terms what they want to do in the game... particularly because these same agendas and passions are given specific game statistics and are responsible for generating experience points in that system.

In 4ed, noncombat skills have been boiled down and reduced to a smaller set of categories. Skill challenges are an interesting new tension-filled way to handle use of skills (though really, some GMs have been doing something similar with 3rd for a while now). However, the vast majority of mechanically defined applications and abilities (and I do mean vast) are all to do with combat. There is a nominal smattering of 'utility powers', and certainly the ritual casting opens up a good few options, but again, it's few options. Combine this with the level requisites for various rituals, and you quickly find that outside of a small parcel of trained skills, your average 4ed character is not, mechanically, very versatile.

I'm going to break my usual rule about comparing 3.5 and 4ed at this point, because 3.5 is the nearest best point of contrast for what I'm observing here. In 3.5, everything was delineated, and skills were fairly extensive. Their use was further enhanced even in an out-of-combat capacity by various feats, prestige classes and sometimes magic items. Monsters often had abilities which were certainly out-of-combat oriented, even if they were only spells and the like. Utility spells complemented skill use, and skills such as Performance provided additional options for players in the social context.

In contrast, I note that, as written, neither the Succubus or the Pit Fiend in 4ed can even detect magic. In the case of player characters, utility-style abilities are heavily level dependent, and you only ever get a limited few. Skill checks are the primary way to get anything done mechanically outside of combat, and in 4ed, anybody can make a skill check. Some are better than others at it, certainly, but if you have a hankering to build a skill-focused character, your options are few. The vast majority of abilities as presented are for tactical combat.

Certainly the GM can add or subtract to a game whatever they like. My policy is that you do not let the system run you; you run the system. But looking exclusively at the mechanical support for given types of actions in 3.5 and 4ed, one can see what the feel of the game is going to be. That said, the feel overall of 4ed may change depending on where they take the game from here (and that is a very big question). As it stands, those people who enjoy diversity in a character and social interactions outside of a peripheral view will probably want to stick with 3.5. How you define your character may start in your head, but the numbers let you know what you can and cannot, absolutely, do in the game. In 4ed, those numbers are almost exclusively, and very specifically, about combat.

Is it wrong? No. A different game than 3.5? Absolutely yes. I'll play both, myself, but I can readily tell what players will enjoy which game more. I still maintain 4ed is a very clean system overall, but it is (currently) a very focused system with a strictly limited perspective on how the world works.

One might think they were planning to make a computer game out of it or something.

Paths, pt 6

2008-07-10T22:18:00.000-07:00

Redemption had always been part of Naello's plans, but he frequently felt as if the opportunities for it were stolen from him, and his bitterness had increased, drop by brackish drop, over the years. This in turn whetted the hunger for atonement, but he could find no way to earn that which he wanted most.

When the neshniya came back with the wrong blood on their hands, at first he'd been outraged. They'd never failed him before, but somehow, the damnable four had managed to evade the neshniya. He quickly realized that being angry at the neshniya was pointless, and feeling foolish quelled his temper just as quickly. But in gathering information, they'd overheard something that made their failure worthwhile.

He looked out the tiny stone window to the broken, bleak land that hid him in apathy and fog, and his back shivered involuntarily at being turned to the neshniya.

This was a possibility, at last.

“Tell me again what you heard,” he said.

The low, impassive voice that replied was like a wisp of cold fog given voice. Chalciere was the neshniya leader, and generally spoke for all of them. “In the city of Arn, a man claims that he has the soul of Martel the Gorecrow. This information was taken from a traveling tinker, heading south from Arn.”

“What else did you hear,” said Naello.

“The information warranted interest, as the quarry might be following the same trail,” continued Chalciere in an even, expressionless tone. “We interrogated several, and discovered the following: the soul is contained in a red glass hourglass, set with hematite. The man in possession is a very rich man in Arn, but he does not pay alliance to any Guildmaster there except in normal dues. The man in possession hires many bodyguards, and intends to sell the hourglass to the highest bidder. He will not leave Arn, knowing that his trade is illegal elsewhere. We know his name and countenance.”

Naello smiled without humor. It was a triumphant grimace more than anything else. Martel's reputation was so tremendous that even now, after his death, people did not want to say his name or remember what he did. Some hadn't even believed he'd been slain.

And the four had killed him.

What if a terrible mistake occurred? What if Martel came back from Hell and destroyed the four who sent him there? And what if Naello were to come forward and defeat Martel in turn?
The red hourglass was almost certainly one of those crafted in Mancora, designed to hold one's life in place for the duration of their unnaturally slow sand-fall. The hourglasses were not well known, and most measured a century rather than an hour. The glass will have been turned, then, to contain Martel's blood-stained soul, and it will hold him for a hundred years... or unless his soul is given somewhere else to rest.

Revenge and redemption, thought Naello.

“Forget the quarry. Go to Arn. Find this man and take the hourglass, and bring it to me. Be as quiet as you can, but kill anyone who interferes, and kill any witnesses who see you take the hourglass.”

The command made his heart contract; he remembered the first time he'd told the neshniya to kill witnesses.

“...kill them quickly,” he added, turning to look at them. “No side trips. No feeding. No torture. But bring me the head of the man with the hourglass.”

They stood there, wrapped in black cloth and hunger, with no sign of deference. Their empty black eyes looked through him, and for a moment, he had to repress the urge to flee, to hurl himself out of the window rather than let them satiate themselves on his body. But they obeyed, leaving the cold hall swiftly on silent feet, with Chalciere last, light as a spider.

When he turned back to the window, the hall seemed colder.

He ignored it.

Rambling

2008-07-07T13:46:00.001-07:00

My second session of 4ed went sliding by this past weekend, and already I'm finding a definite feel for the system. Judging from other opinions and what I've read, skill challenges seem to be a much larger part of the system than the way I have been using them. This seems to be a sort of compensation for the lack of out-of-combat mechanical options given to the players, at least at lower levels.

Overall, the game went smoothly. There are some design decisions I'm still attempting to figure out (the charging rules seem odd to me, for example, though I understand how they are supposed to work), but in general the rule sets were easy enough to pick up. At this point I need to absorb the quirks of the system and bend it where it needs bending.... there's no system in the world that doesn't need bending somewhere, after all.

I had mixed reviews from players about 4ed. Some really don't like it. Others do. Some are neutral. The major complaints, in general, have been the editing/content of the books (which I agree with), and the lack of sufficient mechanical support for anything not having to do with tactical combat (which I agree with in part).

My own opinion has moved into a reasonably neutral one. There are some ideas here which I like, and which I can translate mechanically into my 3.75 campaign (never trust 3.5 by itself). As a system, 4ed is solidified in my mind as a tactical wargame with RP enhancements tacked on. It is a reasonably quick system with a good, solid balanced system foundation. Character options at the moment are very limited, but that also keeps things streamlined which in and of itself is not a bad thing. However, there are some bits and pieces in the rules text which are just not written very well, and I expect as time goes by more rules arguments are going to crop up about things which the designers probably did so many times they figured nobody needed clarification on them. Lastly, I am certain that the foundation of the game is going to suffer when the publisher dumps a horde of new character options into the next set of rulebooks. I hope my certainty is ill-founded... but I'd say it's a safe bet, judging from what I've seen happen in other games time and again.

On the tweaking 3.5 note, I'm very much enjoying the Pathfinder material that has been coming out these days. The Paizo group has been consistent in their creativity and quality, in my opinion, and I see no reason to cancel my subscription with them, even though I don't game nearly often enough to make use of everything I get from them. Even so, spinning source material through my brain always leaves a trail of seeds that burst into something new, and I enjoy that well enough. Integrating some of their rule changes and adaptations for the standard 3.5 system is something I'm playing with at the moment.

As far as playing is concerned, I'll be posting some information about the 4ed scenario that I was testing out this past weekend... and the continuation of that scenario, as well. In this particular adventure, I am adhering strictly to the guidelines presented in the 4ed books, to see how they play out in practice with the sorts of players I run games for. Also, more Paths fiction is on the way.

Until then...

By Request

2008-07-02T10:10:00.001-07:00

Someone asked about the menu for the dinner party... so...

During the Devious Heads game:
Miniature bisteeya
Quail-egg and breading/sesame seed variation on scotch eggs

At table:
First: Watercress vichysoisse
Second: Scallops and sole baked in parchment, on julienned squash, zucchini and carrot// white wine, shallot and tarragon reduction
Third: Smoked, tea-marinated cornish game hen quarters wrapped in green tea crepes// light port and spice reduction, finished with Earl Grey tea
Fourth: Sirloin cuts baked in puff pastry with caramelized fennel and shallots// Mushroom reduction, sauce poivrade
Fifth: chocolate beignets with vanilla-amaretto sauce, ginger-mascarpone cheesecake with walnut crust

Also, there was a vegetarian variant for each of the meat-bearing courses for the single vegetarian at the table. All of the sauces were vegetarian from the get-go.

Dinner with the Despot

2008-06-30T10:02:00.001-07:00

For quite some time now, I've been adapting the plot arc from the Age of Worms adventure path (Dungeon magazine), and my group had finally gotten to the point where they needed information from a decadent prince's advisor. This brought us to Richard Pett's inspiring "Prince of Redhand" adventure, which is more or less entirely revolving around a dinner party.

Being the sort of fellow I am, I'd long since decided to have an in-game dinner party. Due to various difficulties in wrangling NPCs, schedules and other incidents where life kicks one in the shins, this party kept getting delayed. But a weekend ago, pressed for time, I pushed it, and things came together at last.

I didn't get much rest that weekend, but the result was well worth it. The original menu was very bizarre, but I simply didn't have time to do the food fabrication I would have preferred, and instead adhered to a menu with the theme of 'things hidden'. It went for five courses, dinner was all in-character, and people had a fantastic time.

We had four PCs and five NPCs at the table, not including myself. NPCs had 13 points of Favor that they could allocate to anyone else, and they were to keep track of these things. Favor could be given only up to 2 points at a time, but any amount could be taken away at a time. This had little in-game impact, primarily counting for future interactions between the PCs and NPCs, but people were to tell me if they gave someone 6 or more Favor.

Sometimes the Prince didn't care for some of the Favor being thrown around, and it is dangerous to offend him.

On that note, everyone started with points in the Prince's Regard. Everyone also started with three cards, essentially, denoting their ability to resist, influence or otherwise juggle the Prince's Regard. Unfortunately, I was not horribly clear on explaining how to use these cards, so they did not get used as much as I'd hoped... but a few did, and that was quite fine. Each card could only be played once, and of course, the Prince could give or take Regard at his whim. As a result, nobody really knew what their Regard score was by the end of the game... unless it had reached zero, at which point the Prince was not happy with that person, and it was generally fairly obvious.

Even without cards, the politics were fierce at the table, and there was plenty of chicanery going on. I was quite pleased with the result. I'll close this entry off with the rules for Bowling the Devious Heads, which I based off of bocce, and which my players intensely enjoyed (we used a softball for the Dead King, and croquet balls for the Dukes).

Enjoy an ancient Redhand tradition in this simple court game of competition and accuracy, in which individual players divide into Factions in order to win the Throne.

The game is played thus:

One ball is the Dead King.
All other balls are Dukes.
Player order for the first turn is chosen randomly.

I: The host stands at the line and tosses or rolls the Dead King underhanded, to whatever distance desired.

II: The players then take up the Dukes, and each in turn stands at the line, wherever they like, and attempts to land their Duke closest to the Dead King. This continues until all players have made a toss.

III: Players are divided now into Factions. The two closest to the Dead King are one Faction, the two next closest are the second Faction, and so on until all players are in Factions. Factions remain as teams until conclusion of the game.

IV: The player who has landed their Duke closest to the ball is the Regent. He takes up the Dead King and tosses underhanded, just as the host did. If one player is left over after division into Factions, that player tosses the Dead King instead, and is named the Pretender.

V: Players again toss their Dukes in an attempt to be as close to the Dead King as possible, starting with the Regent's Faction partner. Turns follow in Faction order. The Regent throws last of all. If the Pretender lands the Dead King, then he throws second to last, prior to the Regent.

VI: In throwing, it is acceptable to knock the Dead King from his position (this is called Creating an Heir). It is also legal to deliberately knock another Duke away from the Dead King with your Duke (Usurping a Duke), though if the Duke is knocked out of the field, the player gets a new throw.

VII: If a Duke lands or rolls outside of the bounds of the Court, he must be retrieved and thrown again.

VIII Factions accumulate points after the completion of each round. Dukes are scored by the number of Factions which rest entirely outside their distance to the Dead King.
Thus, if a Duke lands closer to the Dead King than 2 other Factions, he scores 2 points. It does not matter whether both Dukes of an opposing Faction are outside, so long as one of them is.
Turns change according to who has the highest points in that round. Thus, a new Regent is appointed. Factions remain the same, and if a Pretender is present, he is always the Pretender.
The game is played until one Faction earns 23 points, though it can be played for longer.

IX In a game with a Pretender, the Pretender cannot win the Throne by himself. His points are calculated normally, but after all other points are calculated, and they are then added to the Faction with the lowest score of THAT round, not the Faction with the lowest score overall. The Pretender can only win with a Faction who scores 23 in the same round they take his point.

Changes

2008-06-18T11:52:00.000-07:00

Well, the day of 4ed is here, and I have been giving the system a look. I've only run one test session so far, but the rules set is fairly comprehensive, and I believe I have a fair idea how things balance out, at least at the low-mid levels.

First off, I've mentioned this to a few people, but it bears repeating. My advice to people is to stop sitting 4ed next to 3.5. They are different games, almost entirely. Sure, some of the mechanics are similar, but they are just not the same. The power scaling is utterly different, the focus of play is different, and the balancing is different. You're better off looking at 4ed as an entirely new rule set for old material.

Some will say, but wait! DnD is about combat. 4ed is just more tactics and combat. Well, yes, it is. Emphasis on tactical action is pretty much the core of 4ed, though I'll point out that tactics certainly existed in 3.5. The difference here is that in 3rd, it is all about what a character can do, and all the options available to build that character. In 4ed, it's all about what the group can do, and the game revolves around tactical combat. This is further emphasized by the stripping down of skill sets and the compartmentalizing of player character classes into very specific roles. My suspicions at this point are also that in order for a group to be viable at higher levels, they must learn to act as a group. This was not as important in 3.5.

In some cases you can regard this as a natural evolution of the super-specialization that tended to occur in 3.5. With so many options available to customize a character, the usual result is characters focused on one aspect of their abilities to the point of exclusion, building glass cannons which then in turn need a group to function outside of theoretical number-crunching exercises.

In any case, I won't be converting my long-running campaign to 4ed. As it turns out, some sorts of characters simply can't mechanically exist in 4ed, for one. I am going to be playing around with 4ed some more, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it ticks. There are a few items about 4ed that I do not like, however.

First, I have a powerful loathing for the tone of writing in any of the core books, especially the PHB. It is an eye-gouging non-stop advertisement about how awesome the game is and how you should want to play it. Sure, this might be fine for trying to open up to new audiences, but I found it annoying. I'd go into a few specifics, but it is seriously not worth commenting on.

Second, though I applaud the overall balance of this edition, it is very clear what the business model is for 4ed. Limited power sets and cookie-cutter characters ensure that people will be champing at the bit for new power lists when new books come out, and if the designers can keep the same balance after a couple splatbooks, I'll be daunted and impressed, because I certainly have my doubts about that. It will be the feat-glut all over again; when you generate 200+ set character abilities meant to diversify and enhance, you will invariably have a large chunk of them which are simply better to take, and the rest will end up ignored. In 4ed, this is very significant, because mechanical differences in a character concept will be very rare unless people decide to take the subpar powers anyway. But why should you?

This is tied into the notion that mechanics can, in fact, influence the general mood of a game, which is something I strongly believe. But that's for another entry.

Also for next time, but briefly posted here: For all those who participated in the Prince of Redhand dinner party, you all were awesome. Without such good PCs and NPCs, the event would not have been nearly so spectacular. Thank you.

Paths, pt 5

2008-06-09T10:02:00.000-07:00

Eoan adored history. He never tired of studying how the threads of event and counter-event were mirrored again and again, nor of watching new threads weave themselves from what had come before. It was easy for him to understand why time was sacred to his people, the Cyroi, and that made him well-suited to be a priest.

To the Cyroi, there were three kinds of priest. Historians were the primary sort, and Eoan was one of these. They recorded, studied, pored over and confirmed the long history of their people, and considered this a prayer to their austere deity, Annum. Of course, Historians were expected to participate actively, whether as witnesses or instigators, in whatever sort of history they focused on, and in that, Eoan was something of a tragic figure.

When the Time for Duty had come to him, he was given to become a Historian of War.

To the Cyroi, to do something is to be resolved utterly to the task. All things were art, and worthy of refinement, if they were going to be done at all. But war was a terrible and repugnant act, and so the Cyroi feared it because they did not like to think about what they became when it was a time for war. Yet, the Unity of Annum demanded that sacrifices be made for the whole, and war, however monstrous, was one of these.

So other Cyroi saw Eoan with respect and sympathy. He was expected to learn war in all forms, to be ready to lead his people if the necessity would ever come, and none ever hoped for it. Like many Cyroi, after the fervor of war had left him, Eoan would weep for those he had slain, but on the field he was a machine of efficiency as cold and inscrutable as the weapons he used.

But studying the wars of the past was not the same. It still tugged at his heart, the death and misery of it all, but he could pore through the scrolls and books and take delight in the patterns there. There was much to learn. Annum taught that strategy is all that is necessary for resolution of conflict. Superior forces and superior numbers can be overcome by intellect.

Every war the Cyroi had been in, they had won because of this teaching. But the cost had been very high indeed, and Eoan's people had long since begun to fade from the world.

Humans, on the other hand, thrived despite all their victories and losses. To the Cyroi view, they were impatient, irrational creatures who kept no vision beyond their children or their children's children, and most were impossibly selfish. But Eoan found them fascinating. He enjoyed charting their progress through history, watching them achieve great things without seeming to think about it, or understand the significance of their actions. Being young, it was only recently that he'd even met a human being, but those had been notable exceptions to the rule.

When his Call had come, the great storm-oracle Maharwen had taken him in, and through her, he'd met the four humans who had rediscovered Camwhyr's tomb, Camwhyr the Seventh King. They'd brought the Fragment from the tomb to the Cyroi people, and that was significant beyond understanding, and he had been impressed with their sense of obligation. The Fragment was, in many ways, part of a greater key to the Cyroi future, and he knew what it meant.

But in his heart, Eoan most adored the four for bringing out the poetry of Camwhyr's age. They'd recovered the Lament of Minmordhan, the death-poem of a guardian soldier whose name was lost to Duty, the paen for Camwhyr, and so many more. For Eoan, their recognition of that beauty was an inspiration to him. As he sat under the stars, lost in thoughts of his race's golden age, he remembered the four who had given his people some of their lost grace, and he prayed that when it came his time, his Duty ended, that he would be as eloquent as Camwhyr himself had been.

“Stone by stone
I built my heart into a temple to my people

Now it is the open sky
And the clouds are my memories to them”

-Death poem of Camwhyr, Virtue of the East Wind, Thunder at Dawn, Master of the Field of Haoon.

Paths, pt 4

2008-05-30T15:33:00.000-07:00

Bound, the magician glared defiantly at Sargon, who looked back at the man impassively.

“You have no power left,” said Sargon, matter-of-factly, and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his powerful knees. “You fought us. But you work magic, and so we are offering you this chance to join us, and become free.”

The magician gave him a mirthless grin. “You are all utterly insane,” the magician said with great certainty.

Sargon dropped his brows a notch and sighed. He was a Lightbringer, and this was something he hated about his duties. Chained to their by-rote incantations and their books, the outlander magicians were always too attached to the tyranny of their arcane science, and never wanted to give it up.

“Be reasonable, as we are,” Sargon offered, but the magician was ignoring him now. Sargon continued anyway, keeping his low voice reasonable and mild. “We respect that you know magic, and can use it. But you must see that these limitations you put on yourself are not only controlling your magic, they are constricting who you are. You are caging yourself.”

“And this is your answer? You send ... that... to attack me in my sleep!”

The magician jerked his head towards Trammel's slender, wiry form. The addict was absently rubbing the magician's formerly enchanted ring against his pale cheek, keeping half a heavy-lidded eye on the prisoner.

“That's just strategy. He could have killed you, but he didn't, did he? He just stole your power so we could more easily talk to you.”

“Very diplomatic of you,” spat the magician in reply. “What did you do to him to make him that way?”

Sargon paused. This was not a question he'd been asked before, but he expected there would be many more, in time. “He was born that way. There are many like him, and they serve the Bethorans just as all Bethorans do.”

“Born? You see, that's what your skybending gets you! You ruin the land around you, and then your own children!”

Sargon frowned a bit. “There's no need to be insulting. There's nothing wrong with Trammel. I've trusted him as a comrade in arms since we were both young men.”

The magicians only reply was a sardonic chuckle, and a shake of the head.

Sargon folded his burly arms and cocked an eyebrow. He did not want to kill the man, but they couldn't very well let him go as he was. Their Skyhammer, Nariste, was working a great divination, and he could not ask her for guidance.

He glanced over at their Heretic, Avara, who was some distance away sorting the piles of loot they'd gathered from the small border fort. Ever attentive, she looked up abruptly, like a wolf scenting prey, and he signaled her closer.

Like Sargon, Avara was a warrior. Both had the swarthy complexions, dark hair and golden eyes typical of the Bethoran pure-blooded, but her long-limbed body was far taller than his, all sinew and muscle. Avara was the same without as she was within, stripped of all but purpose.

“What do we do,” he asked her in Flametongue. “He will not see reason, and I dare not disturb Nariste.”

She turned her thin lips into a frown, and replied in kind. “We have time yet. He may come to understand what we bring to his people. It will be two days yet until we move further north.”
He nodded, and was about to reply when the magician spoke up.

“Trying to decide what to do with me? I warn you, savages, I am a member of the Greenstone Tower! If I am killed, my brethren will seek you out and destroy you, and by the God of Ceria- “

“THERE IS NO GOD BUT MAN!!” howled Avara, and smashed the magician in the face with her gauntleted fist.

Sargon was not fast enough to stop what happened, though he'd tried as soon as the magician invoked a deity. He stood up and gave Avara a bland look.

“...Avara, this is not going to help,” he growled.

“I claim Heretic's right,” said Avara immediately. “He blasphemed against Humanity.”

“But he was a magician, he could have joined us.”

“He WAS a magician. But he swore by a false god. And that makes him a slave.”

A reedy sigh interrupted them, followed by Trammel's soft, mellifluous voice. “And you have made him dead. Problem resolved.”

Paths, pt 3

2008-05-24T20:59:00.000-07:00

Three of the golem-men marched past Kivv. They did not see him, squeezed in an old ore fissure, and when they were ten paces away, he slipped down the passage in the opposite direction.

Something serious had happened. Kivv and the others had heard the conflict echo through the old mine tunnels, but it had stopped abruptly. Now, the golem-men were all on alert, patrolling with scimitars drawn, and the strange humans with the arrogant eyes and vicious features also moved in groups. Before, many of them seemed idle.

Kivv had been sent to discover more, and he'd seen the bodies being carried back through the tunnels. Someone else had come against the Dollmaker, and they were accounting well for themselves.

Confusion to my enemies, Kivv thought, and again regretted Tinka's order forbidding him to kill on his outing. Kivv hated wasted opportunities, but an order was an order.

He froze, stone-still except for one long ear which cocked itself to track approaching footsteps. His wrapped feet merely whispered as he moved to crouch behind a support beam, and shortly two of the strange humans strode by. To the kobold view, they were sword-faced, with long features and narrow, wicked eyes. Their heads were wrapped in long silk scarves and they wore long draping coats, but Kivv knew they'd both have light armor underneath. Like some of the other servants of the Dollmaker, these seemed to be very pleased at the idea of combat.
Decadents, Kivv thought, watching them go. But no less dangerous for that... just more worthy of contempt.

Like most kobolds, Kivv's personal philosophy revolved around the linchpin of Advantage. But as a slanik, he lived a fairly ascetic lifestyle, and had a vague disdain for those who loved comforts. He felt that indulgence was a trap, something that softened you against hardship.

Gliding through the tunnels, he clambered quietly into an air shaft, wormed his way upward with typical kobold rapidity, and then rolled into the old crevice he'd found earlier. Some movement of the earth years ago had split the stone between the air shaft and an upper mining tunnel, and from there, he quickly made his way to the hidden camp where his compatriots were resting.
Enek the shaman was keeping watch. Kivv took a moment to spot Enek's soot-covered form, inwardly grinning at the shaman's aptitude, and then moved past him into the grotto where Tinka and her son Tanaruk were.

Tinka turned her shrewd and regal eyes to him. “What did you discover?”

“It is true. Someone else is attacking the Dollmaker, and has destroyed many of the guardians in the lower passageways. They're all on alert now, and are searching for the enemy. They think what we've done is the other group's work. There are still many of the chanters and monastics left, and I cannot get further in to the Observatory without being noticed.”

He recited the locations and numbers of the guard stations he'd seen, and Tinka questioned him briefly. She then turned to Tanaruk, who had been sitting somberly with hands folded.

“My son?”

“...The advantage is ours. Have Enek prepare a distraction below-tunnels. They will be on alert for this. But their resources are tightening. The Dollmaker will not directly intervene, she is too dedicated to her work. Divine when the others may assault again, and trigger the distraction about the same time. When this occurs, we stab for the Observatory.”

Tinka sampled this plan, narrowing her eyes in thought, and then slowly nodded. “That is what we will do. Kivv, bring Enek here and stand guard for him.”

“Immediately.”

Kivv slipped back down the passageway, grinning, for he knew their time had come at last.

Paths, pt 2

2008-05-09T20:06:00.000-07:00

Few recognized Tepektu as a seer. He loomed over most men, with a champion's shoulders and the grace of some unnamed, forgotten hero. Bereft of his hood, his face was broad and regally handsome, an emperor's portrait carved from polished teak wood. He'd used this proud bearing to his advantage for years, building a business as a spice merchant, and later, as a broker for goods one had great difficulty finding. He was often assumed to be the half-noble by-blow of some Betrani prince, and in time, he'd become the rich and powerful merchant lord everyone assumed he was.

Few would recognize the true reasons for his success, also. He kept his arcane skill a secret, for he knew how much power the unknown gave him over others. But Tepektu's ability to read the Influences was profound. His talent in sifting through the facets of causality had kept him moving, kept him reaching for more opportunity.

It had also infected him with a degree of fatalism.

Before him, moving under his huge dark hands, discs named for events and people shifted back and forth in a web, and he scowled at one small collection of them. Tepektu rubbed at his chin, considering the patterns.

This is how he ferreted out secrets. He would map the Influences, watch the names shift back and forth through the web, and he would note where they did not go. He would study the areas that went untouched, and then he would divine where those areas matched. In those blank spaces, secrets hid.

For some while now, the problem was in four parts, each bumping into the areas he intended to explore. There they were, again, and again: the Lady of Mirrors, the Wolf-Queen, the Star-binder, and the Gate Warden. Ever since they'd beaten him to the tomb of Camwhyr, he'd been dedicated to staying three steps ahead of them, and so far he'd done so. But lately, in his map of fate, they were leaping through obstacles like lightning to the earth.

Tepektu noted other groups moving along similar paths, but none so close to his as they. They knew of him, but they'd never seen him except once in a vision. He knew they were doomed to meet eventually. No matter what decision he made, if he remained dedicated to his course, they would meet. This did not trouble him; there had been others, before.

Tepektu was still here. The others were not.

Watching the four progress through his map, however, troubled him. Tracing the Influences that pushed at them, tugging their path into swerving here or there, he saw grand and dreadful things. The eruption at Sinid that destroyed a city, the death of one of the Three from poison, the strange dead-star that fell on the plains of Uryashar, the raising of a massive temple near Pesh, the hollow man epidemic at Yhelm, the hags from Dourmoor; whether or not these four were involved or even close to any of these dreadful events didn't matter.

The pattern mattered. The ripples pushed and pulled at the choices the four had, and steered them ever onward, driven by whatever their own ambitions might be. They were carrying a great momentum, and finally, he saw now the empty space that these events surrounded. There were portents, huge and far-flung, and Tepektu was watching at the right place and right time to understand what they enclosed.

At the moment, he did not know if the four understood. But he believed they did.

Tracing his hand along the threads, he examined the silvery collection of icons close to him. Around the Ring-Maker were the Locksmith, the Riddled Prince, the Fire Twin, the Eclipse Daughter, and now, finally, the White Ribbon. Reading the Influences underneath his outspread fingers, he let his hand shift along with the whorls and pools of event and counter-event.
Tepektu's quick, grasping mind studied the icons on the way, and chained them together with symbols. It was inevitable. The four would cross his path again. Both of them were aimed at the Moonstone, an icon prefacing the large hollow in the center of the pattern.

When he came to a conclusion and finished interpreting the Influences, he sat back in his chair, folded his massive arms, and frowned. It was with deliberation and determination that he selected a new icon, one made of burnt black wood, and set it firmly into the center of this space.

His study was utter stillness for some while before a voice addressed him.

“And what is that marker for? The end of the world?”

“No,” replied Tepektu. “It is a time when the world wishes it could end.”

Paths

2008-04-29T22:04:00.000-07:00

Last game of DnD, my players encountered an oracle, who discussed with them some of the events going on that they were unaware of. Naturally, it's a bit cryptical, given that the oracle didn't know precisely what the truth was either, but the players got a fair amount out of it. In essence, there were five other 'parties' running parallel to the player group. These parties had their own agendas, but due to circumstance and coincidence, tend to follow along the same courses the players do.

Originally, to give the players something to think about, I was going to post a brief snippet of the views of these other parties, and what's happening with them. And that got me thinking about how many stories go unspoken in my campaign. Very nearly any NPC with a name has a backstory and a history. Half of them just sort of explode out of my poor head, fully created, and less than a fourth ever get their full story revealed. So, as a periodic addition here, I'll be posting some pieces of NPC information that never got (nor is likely to be) revealed. This is not only for the DnD group's benefit...I'll be including NPCs from other games too, and I'd like to think some people NOT in my games (I don't have time to run for everybody these days) will get some inspiration and enjoyment out of it.

So, here we have the Path of Hunger.

For a long time, Naello had been terrified. It had been a quiet thing at first, a vague whisper of unease, but as he grew older, his fear grew in turn. His faith hadn't given him respite against the slow inevitability of age, and as his warrior's body tired and weakened, his desperation had grown.

He knew perfectly well that what he'd done was wrong, but how could he have continued to help the world if he became some doddering old man?

Now, cast out from his home city and despised by all those who were once peers and friends, he scowled out at a tangled, thorn-riddled forest, wishing the bleak iron gray of the sky into the hearts of those four who had made a ruin of everything.

The deaths in the city hadn't been his fault. The horrors that followed would never have happened if the four hadn't interfered, but they had.

Naello still had resources, and he intended to prove to the world that he wasn't finished yet. He refused to be remembered as a monster, and refused to succumb to the underhanded treachery that fate had chosen to deal him.

Word had reached him that the dwarf Adun was slain. Martel the Gorecrow, an old foe, also slain. The four had been responsible for both, and now they were running some errand for Caradoc, the one man who never trusted Naello, even from the beginning.

Turning from the stone maw of his window, Naello looked at the black-wrapped huddles behind him, and felt a chill.

These are loyal, he reminded himself. They are loyal, and they will die to do what is right. And I will tell them what is right.

“Listen well. These are the ones you must kill...”

In the days that passed, some farmers near the edge of the wilderness would look up, feeling unease, but they would see nothing, and return to work. Rumors of shadows in the woods grew, and children weren't allowed to stay out after dark. No one knew exactly why, but their instincts told them with a shudder that something was out there.

Much later, bones would be found in the forest, hidden, and gnawed clean. The occasional lone traveler would be noted missing, but most of the bones would go unnamed.

The five moved unseen. They would listen at windows in the evening, loping silently along back roads and hidden paths, covering great stretches of ground because their hunger made them tireless. Skulking, they collected whispers and rumors, and over time built a path to take them to their quarry. The five moved like the black talons of a single hand, slipping from the dark thickets of the wilderness to the edges of country roads, and then further north and east to lurk in wide fields and scattered forests.

A month since Naello had unleashed them, they circled a township nestled in some verdant hills, and caught a scout near there. They told him what they wanted to know, and they ate him, and took his bones to leave no traces. They were not the first devourers in that area, they knew; they'd found old ghoul tracks.

When they came near the burial mound hidden in the woods, they felt the faint tingle of consecration on the area, and fanned out, pale shadows wrapped in black, flitting between pool of moonlight and streak of midnight, shifting slowly, intent on their task.

Early that morning, Caer Ondal's villagers heard a frightening ululation in the night, and they wondered if the ghoul-worshippers had not yet been wiped out.

The truth was that the neshniya had found the scent they'd been seeking for so long. By sun-up, they were already miles away, hunting for Naello's designated prey.

Excerpt: The Hand of Bethor

2008-04-19T13:07:00.000-07:00

“Most years, they stay in the wilderness. We see their witchlights and the violet flames in the distance. It is not well to enter that land, because of the work they do... some years, they come out and bring their work against us. They shout of freedom and power, but we have seen what they are. They are all mad.”
Herennya, Matriarch of the Hhanash iron druids

“The Church of Bethor is insidious beyond measure. Somehow, though they are all mad, many choose to join them. Their numbers swell when they skulk in our cities. Soon after, the battle is joined, and the Church of Bethor attempts to enslave all those who do not join their blasphemy. They hold great power, but it is power which destroys their own as well as others.”
From the roster of Blasphemous Cults, in the High Temple of Kesr.

“Bethorans aren't mad in the way most people think. They see the world differently, maybe, but they're very rational. At least, the leaders are. Look past the insane cultists, look past their zealotry, and you'll notice... they're smart. They plan, they plan far ahead, and they're good at improvising when things don't go well for them. It's easy to say they're just madmen, but the Bethorans have been in the world for over five hundred years. Clearly, they know what they're doing... whatever that is.”
From the personal journals of Wallace Rievenfeld

Viewed as insane cultists with an obsession for stealing enchanted items, the Bethorans are actually a sophisticated and ancient society who views magic as an essential form of expression. Though splinters of the organization have secretly lodged in cities far from their homeland, most still consider the Bethorans as backwards-minded fanatics who have little to no order at all.

The Bethorans are actually two connected groups. Bethoran purebloods are those born Bethoran, usually raised in their magic-tainted homeland. Adopted Bethorans are outsiders who have been accepted into Bethoran culture. These groups work in conjunction to further the goals of the Bethoran whole, although many adopted Bethorans are not sane enough to understand the bigger picture, and are used as a barrier to those investigating the truth of the Bethoran movement.

The Vision of Bethor

Skybending was the first magical technique known to humans. In this method, the magician becomes a funnel for raw magical power, and attempts to shape it with his will as it explodes out of him. Though this process is capable of incredible creation, it is also inherently dangerous, and prolonged skybending in a given area can create various forms of magical pollution. As such, skybending in the current age is completely forbidden in nearly all civilizations.

Humans learned the fundaments of modern magic from the High Elves. The elves presented a cleaner, more efficient wizardry, allowing a reliable technique that did not corrupt the surroundings. Most humans jumped at the chance to learn, but there are rare exceptions mentioned in history. One such name was Bethor Chainmaker.

Bethor was a very successful skybender and warrior, chieftain to a large nomadic clan in what are now the wilds of Amboq. Accounts of the day state that he refused the elven teachings, calling them subtle tyrants who were attempting to control and subjugate humanity by restricting their power. He claimed they feared human ascension, though he did say it was a justifiable fear, for he believed humans are mighty.

Bethor's philosophy was that magic is the purest expression of the human will, and therefore, any attempt to codify or constrain or restrict magic is an attempt to restrain and limit human potential. He believed that magic is for all, and should be used in all situations.

In response to the quickly spreading elven influence, Bethor's clan absorbed several other large clans in the territory, and began to teach skybending to anyone with the fortitude to use it, as a prelude to waging open war. Accounts differ wildly on the events of Bethor's war, but it is true that he drove the elves away from his people, using massive magical assaults that claimed the lives of many of his own people as well as the enemy. The arcane fallout from these magical assaults would be the the foundation for the bizarre and erratic magical influences that blanket the Amboq, influences which would increase further from generations of skybending.

It is uncertain what happened to Bethor himself. It is assumed that any further records of Bethor's life are somewhere in the Amboq, if not destroyed. After the war, his people fortified their homeland and presumably retreated to develop the foundations of modern Bethoran culture. Would-be invaders avoided the Amboq, afraid of the seething magic that had racked the land, and the Bethorans did not leave the Amboq for several generations. The true history of the Bethorans remains unknown, and few historians are willing to brave the Amboq for further records..

Metagame

2008-04-04T11:33:00.000-07:00

It's been a while.

I tend to be ambitious about running my games, and unfortunately, my ambition got away with me this time. Due to impending schedule changes, I have to postpone my Dark Heresy game until further notice. This gripes me a bit; I was looking forward to it, but my other two games are going really very well, so I don't feel I have much room to complain.

Speaking of which, I've been mentioning some peculiarities of pacing in one of those games. Specifically, the game is Kult, which for those not familiar, is in the 'personal horror' genre. I've run a good many Kult games up to this point. The base system is not particularly good, in my opinion, but the way the game handles sanity (itself very subjective in the game) is quite elegant, and there is a strong mechanical impact on facets of the character's personality... or vice versa. I believe that this touch is one of the keys as to why Kult games tend to go through the same stages, regardless of the player base or the story the GM is running.

In Kult, at least, stages of the game are defined by character development, and they come at particular break points. Though the break points might be spaced differently from game to game, they follow the same order, and in my current game I was able to predict them to the very session they occurred. The curious might define these stages as follows:

Exploration: Upon discovering something not in the world view, the PCs start edging out of their normal environment. This brings them closer together as a group, often regardless of differences. Their curiosity pulls them forward.

Attachment: At this point, the PCs have attached their desires and ambitions to events. This is usually where the players themselves have gotten a better feel for their characters, which I believe is a strong contribution to this breakpoint. This is the place where directions are decided upon, which invariably leads to:

Conflict: The world isn't what they thought it was. Now, the PCs are finding that THEY aren't who they thought they were, and neither are their friends. I describe this moment as me putting guns on the table, and the PCs all pointing them at each other. Part of this is certainly a deeper understanding of the characters being played, but it is also a natural reaction to something else that tends to occur by this point in a Kult game... which is, PCs lose control of themselves and their uglier sides tend to show.

Them Against Us: This is where it gets tricky. The isolation gets to the PCs. They don't have anyone to turn to except themselves... better the familiar enemy than the unknown, in the worst case. In a way, the party turns inward to try and deal better with the outside influences. It doesn't tend to be the least bit comfortable.

There are a couple other points, but my Kult players read this, and I don't want to spoil the surprise.

Each Kult game I've run (and been in), these happen, right on schedule. This doesn't come from any attempt to steer the players. They react to story lines and situations, and this pattern just ends up happening. I find it fascinating to consider why, and chatting with my players about this got me to thinking about patterns that happen in other RPGs. In My Life With Master, this sort of irrevocable progress is actually mechanically supported, which is one reason I regard the game as utter genius, but in Kult the process is far more organic. I do believe that those games which provide mechanical support for character personality elements are those which might have a stronger set of patterns (Humanity in Vampire, Mental Balance in Kult, Sanity in Call of Cthulhu, etcetera, though the CoC pattern seems to be 'investigators go mad/die').

I'll be looking at my games closely. You should, too. You might be surprised at what behavioral models you find at the table.

LARP dynamics? That's an entirely different beast. I'm not going there.

Well, not this time.

A quick update

2008-03-23T21:16:00.000-07:00

What with classes finishing up, along with a friend's impending wedding and a number of other busy-nesses, I've let this sit for a little while. So, here's a few quick notes to tide people over.

1/ Paizo, if you hadn't heard, is essentially allowing its audience to playtest their upcoming Pathfinder system, which is DnD 3.75. I'll be posting my full impressions on this soon. You can download the Alpha rules set for free on their website... check it out, and join in.

2/ I've been looking at the pieces of 4.0 that keep creeping out there. I'm interested, but I admit, anything that gets really hyped up always leaves me cold. It's an anti-marketing reflex, I suppose. Now, that said, I like some of the concepts they are kicking around, but while reading about 4.0, I happened across a quote, which is the basis for /3.

/3 A fellow stated that he was happy about what he'd heard regarding 4.0, because it will make the monsters smarter.
....
No.
No, no no.
YOU make the monsters smarter. The game system, no matter how cool it is, does not magically enhance the intelligence level of your encounters. The system is just a tool to resolve conflicts, and it may offer you more options to determine the outcome (i.e. the simple 'I swing and hit' as opposed to a system that allows hitting, grappling, tripping, stunning, frying eggs in combat or whatever else).
Systems, depending on their architecture, will bias the feel of a game. But ultimately, the one running the game has control over the system. It's a tool. It doesn't use you.

/4 I do, very much, enjoy the general movement towards simplification that is going on with the fantasy RPG market today. I have a general sense that fantasy gaming is beginning to turn full circle, and head back to its roots.
Of course, that means it'll probably turn into a cottage industry again, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Well, unless you want to make money writing games.

More to come, soon.

Level Up! pt 2

2008-03-14T11:08:00.000-07:00

In Destined, there are many planes of existence, but all of them overlap in a central bubble, which is the Destiny Plane. All other planes are limited by their nature in potential and change, but the Destiny Plane represents all of their possibilities. Within the Destiny bubble, there are universes upon universes flowing in a constant stream of actions and consequences and events. The strongest of these streams within a stream is the Destiny Prime, which represents the campaign world. Whether or not it is one single world among many, or several universes in itself isn't important for this discussion. What is important here is that destiny flows strongest through the Prime.

Destiny here is not a passive force. It isn't a foreordained doom or prophecy that comes to pass automatically. Destiny in this cosmology is fluid, and uncertain. However, it does obey certain laws. We'll examine these laws in the context of levels.

Levels, in the Destined setting, are interpreted as accumulations of destiny (not that any character has any notion of this). The more levels one has, the more significant one's destiny has become, be it through personal decisions or mere circumstance. When a character goes from level 1 to level 5, they are forcing their will for change upon the cosmos, and though destiny is grudging, it will move once enough momentum is generated.

As the character continues to advance in levels, they face greater difficulties, because destiny naturally seeks equilibrium. This is one reason why higher level encounters, before apparently unnoticed or simply not there, abruptly crop up when characters reach a higher level. Destiny pushes back, when it gets pushed... to the point of suddenly throwing momentum into a local ogre, say, who the characters might remember as being a lowly warlord. This local ogre suddenly finds things happening in his favor, and behold, he becomes a monstrous emperor with a great army. When one carries great destiny, others of similar weight are drawn to you. This works both ways; a standard fantasy trope is that a mighty evil overlord appears, only to be overthrown by an unlikely group of heroes... who level up very quickly, don't they?

Just as destiny can pool against the dam of a high level character, it can also drain from a place when equilibrium is met. Though it is difficult to simulate mechanically, I judge that accumulated destiny fades if the possessor does nothing with it, or has achieved his goals, or otherwise ceased to carry momentum. In a good many legends, great heroes eventually die from some small, minor thing after they've done with being great heroes, and I use that as a proof. Hercules is slain by a poisoned shirt, for example. Sure, it was assumed it was a very nasty poison, but maybe he just didn't have the saving throw he used to.

In my campaign, I restrict this increase/decrease effect to NPCs only. I'm continually toying with a mechanical representation of this, inspired by the excellent Spiritual Attributes mechanic of Riddle of Steel (fantastic game, play it if you get the chance). In sum, the SA mechanic means that your character only 'levels up' when they are pursuing certain aspects of their life which are tremendously important to them, and further, those SA's provide mechanical benefit. A peasant who believes in his cause can be a surprisingly strong adversary to a well-trained knight who doesn't have a cause at all. I see destiny as working in the same way. Sometimes it is thrust upon someone, usually to counterbalance the actions of another. Sometimes it is gathered unconsciously by those who have something to prove to the world.

The notion of the Destiny Prime spawned some other ideas, also. If there is a Prime, then there are alternate realities within the Destiny Plane that have branched off from decisions made in the Prime. These decisions are significant enough to create a different stream, but most of these end up flowing back into the Prime. Some, however, do not, and form bubbles of their own. Perhaps one day, their events, histories and contents will be seamlessly integrated into the Prime if they grow close enough, but until then, they rest apart. Some fundamental decision, somewhere back in the chain of causality, made these bubbles very different sorts of places. The inhabitants of the Prime are utterly unaware of these destiny bubbles, and would probably be disturbed at some of them.

My submission to the Wizards of the Coast setting search competition was one such bubble, a world called Rhoa. In Rhoa, conflict is hard-coded into the flow of destiny; there will never really be peace there. The divergence from the Prime ensures that conflict will continue. This makes it a brutal, visceral sort of place where beauty is precious and fleeting. The setting has gone through several stages of refinement and expansion since its creation for the competition, and I'll be sharing some facets of it in later posts.

Final note for today: My players are all awesome. I'm a happy man.

Level Up! pt 1

2008-03-14T11:03:00.000-07:00

Levels are a common way to designate degrees of power in RPGs. How levels are interpreted, and the size of the power difference from one to the other can vary, but if levels exist, there are some questions lurking in the background.

What is really the difference between level 1 and level 5? How many people of a given level are there? If earning a level is a more or less permanent thing (barring undead exposure or temporary death), then why is it most people never get past level 1? Surely a level 1 commoner racks up experience points enough to become a level... 5 commoner during the course of a full lifetime.

'Leveling up' means more skills, more powers, more hit points, and occasionally more spells. A higher level person is simply harder to kill, and when you use your average in-game scale for damage ratings, anyone beyond level 5 is practically superhuman. A level 10 character fades next to the earth-shaking power of level 15. And before anyone scoffs and points out 'omg, but look at all the level 20-30s', I'd like to remind them that realistically (if you can use such a word here), 95% of the game world's population is going to be level 1.

Perspective, please. Level 10 means, to the average joe, you are unstoppable. You are a mighty hero (or terrifying villain, or just powerfully indifferent). How high levels are depicted in an RPG is a topic for another day, but we'll touch on it briefly here.

I've noticed a fair amount of neglect in showcasing just how significant higher level characters are in the world. Part of it is that most GM s keep to the basic strategy of 'Can the PCs do this?' At high level play, the tagline shouldn't be whether or not they can, but whether or not they Should. This is particularly important in games like White Wolf's Exalted, where the system guarantees that the PLAYERS shape the story, regardless of what the GM might have in mind. A GM who tries to do the usual dungeon-crawl-and-faceoff-versus-powerful-bad-guy tactic may find themselves a little overwhelmed. In DnD the power scale runs a much wider range, with a higher degree of uncertainty in the mechanics. But the significance of a high-level character's actions should definitely be made plain.

Again, the question of 'should', rather than 'can we'?

My brain locked on to the reasons why, precisely, a high level character became so powerful. Why weren't there so many of them? How hard is it, really, to level up? The system of experience points converting to levels is a very abstract concept, and one that has seen a fair amount of parody.

So, I created a cosmology to explain it. This was the spark that eventually generated the default campaign setting that I use, which I simply call Destined (yeah, fine, shoot me, it's what I've got at the moment).

Unreasonable

2008-03-07T10:47:00.000-08:00

I'll be running a Dark Heresy game sometime soon, something limited session. While considering the plot I had in mind, something short and dreadfully suspenseful, I pondered quite a bit on my own interpretation of the Warhammer 40K setting, which Dark Heresy uses.

Reinterpreting or reinventing the work of other people has been a long-time tradition, even if not necessarily time-honored. The popularity of spinning ideas into new directions is quite plain; one only needs to see the amount of fanfiction out there to understand that. Being the sort of creative zealot I am, I much prefer to generate my own material, but I find it very rewarding and inspiring at times to grow new ideas from someone else's proverbial flowerbed.

Generally, this tends to follow from one of two instances. First, there is something incongruous or illogical or ... just plain odd... which goes unexplained. Second, there is some mechanic in the game system that needs some manner of rationalization to fit into the world, unless you simply intend to gloss over or ignore its presence in-game.

The example I've been sharing recently with a couple friends has to do with the Sisters of Battle. Now, you can come up with all sorts of funny reasons why your standard 40K outfit has tremendous shoulderpads (portable refrigerators for beer) or extraordinarily spiky helmets (pick up pay-per-view three planets away), but what caught my attention was that in almost all illustrations of the Sisters, they are portrayed as beautiful. Stern, maybe, and a few artists toss on a battle scar or two... but beautiful.

Well, we all know how popular hot chicks with guns are for the market.

What do I see? I see women who are taken in as orphans, and raised to a grim, stoic life of faith and militancy. I see women who are indoctrinated to be fanatical warrior-nuns, sworn to burn the heretic and defend the Emperor and the Church. Beauty? Beauty isn't a necessity for soldiers. Why would they all be beautiful?

My brain simmered that in the futuristic dark-ages of the 40K setting, and came up with a conclusion.

I see women who undergo ritual plastic surgery at age 18, so that every single one of them looks like the Founder of their respective order. That means only six possible faces for hundreds of thousands of warrior-nuns. Same hair, same armor, same face, and same faith. It's the capstone to a dehumanizing process to ensure they understand their place. To me, that's the sort of psychological twist that makes the 40K setting evocative. It doesn't always have to be about the out-sized shoulder pads and huge guns.

In terms of mechanics... the level system in Dungeons and Dragons has always warranted a closer look. Just what -are- levels, anyway? How does it translate in the game world, when someone is level 10 and fights someone level 1?

Hit points, at least, you can interpret as skill as well as physical endurance. Rather than saying "The ogre cuts open your leg" on a hit, you might say "You barely manage to parry the ogre's blade, but it shoves you off balance and you feel your arm grow tired". Either way, this is translated as damage. In the case of hit points as skill/fatigue, your character might not even suffer a real wound until you are brought to zero. Everything before that fatal blow would have been exhausting parries, scratches, near-misses and fatigue. Or whatever else.

But what -are- levels? Why precisely is a level 10 person so far above your average level 1 person?

My own interpretation of this mechanic will be the topic of the next post, in which I also explain how it contributed to a cosmology.

In Memoriam

2008-03-04T16:26:00.000-08:00

My first gaming book ever was the Monster Manual. Very first edition, when 'Advanced' Dungeons and Dragons was still new.

I don't even remember how I got it these days. Maybe I saved up enough allowance or something, maybe it was a gift. Either way, I still have what's left of it. The spine is mostly gone, the cover art is faded and spotty, and when I flip through it these days, I have to chuckle at the bad coloring jobs I did on some of the illustrations... not to mention the illustrations I put in there to fill in the gaps.

When I got the book, it was just a strange book to me. It was a source of wonderment, a guidebook to an unearthly world written in a code of numbers and strange words that I did not yet understand. Not knowing the game then, I made up meanings for these numbers and words, and made my own stories for why these creatures existed, what they did, and how they acted. In some ways, it was a choose-your-own-adventure book for me.

Of course, I did understand there were other such books, somehow connected, and later, I got these as well. I kept a lot of my old ideas, and squeezed the game I had just learned to fit the frame of the painting the Monster Manual had already begun. In these early days, interpreting, reinterpreting and improvising around the keys I had been given would provide the foundations of the world-building I do today, and not just strictly in the sense of gaming.

I still have my first copy of the Dungeon Master's Guide, too, and it has fared much better than the Monster Manual. On occasion, I pick it up just to read a section or two, for inspiration and a return to the flourishing roots of my creative history.

I have Gary Gygax to thank for these things. Whatever people might say about his writing (and I'm sorry, Gary, but your novels weren't great), whatever people might say about his attitude, he was a pioneer, and for me, he was the author that showed me best that my dreams and visions could be not only accessible to others, but shared. They could be protagonists in stories so grand no one author could possibly pen them.

Further, there was a flavor to Gygax's work that I enjoyed. In particular, I had the distinct feeling that when Gary was writing a rulebook or discussing the game, he simply expected that if you were bothering to read what he was writing, you knew what he was talking about. He didn't make any concessions, and I respect that. Also, the slapdash creative energy behind Gygax and his peers was wonderful. Oh, sure, some of those early dungeons were silly... but only if you didn't think about why they -could- be possible.

Coming up with plausible explanations as to 'why'... well, that was one of the best creative exercises I have ever involved myself with. Many a spark of inspiration began in just such a way.

Today, the gaming world is a vastly different place. If you read the earliest Dragon or White Dwarf magazines, they are a cozy, almost scholarly read (actually, quite scholarly at times). The authors were writing to peers and associates. Today, gaming publications have to be far more generalist, particularly in the cases of those with corporate pressure for profit margins. Though this is quite understandable, let's face it... creativity tends to suffer when you have to take too much bean-counting into consideration. Thankfully, there are still some wonderfully flavorful and innovative people out there (Paizo, I'm looking at you guys), and though I see a smaller future for gaming, I believe it will be a very vivid one.

In some ways, I'm glad to know Gary had a chance to see things grow as they have. I do hope that he had pride in playing his part in all this. For my part, whenever I feel my inspiration clogged, I'll pull down my tired copy of the Monster Manual, and let the older dreams sift back in through my hands.

That's where I'll thank Gygax for following his own dream.

ps Rob Kuntz, you aren't allowed to leave this mortal coil without revealing at least 2 more sections of Castle Maure. Period. I will hire a necromancer, I swear it.

The Cult of Mormo, pt 5: ...Mormo

2008-02-28T17:22:00.000-08:00

Mormo is a coward.

An immortal creature that is terrified of dying, Mormo carries a grudge against all those to whom death is natural (mortals), and those who need never fear it (true gods). He is a dreadfully jealous and embittered monster who gluts himself on the suffering of anything weaker than he is. As noted previously, mere death does not satisfy his hatred, and now he feeds on the acts of desecration and defilement. They are a form of sustenance to him.

Whether or not Mormo was always this way is unknown, perhaps even to him.

There are many theories about his origins. Due to his furtive nature and his diligence at keeping himself hidden, Mormo's trail is a vague one at best. Those willing to examine his works in-depth might discover that the earliest traces of worship to Mormo emerge in the bleak land of Tiharanc, historically an area where disillusionment in religion and authority is high. Tiharanc's population has been crushed under the weight of many a tyrant, who often claim right of rulership through the local faith, and wield the church as a tool of authority.

Perhaps Mormo was some form of very powerful, hibernating ghoul that somehow absorbed all the bitterness and contempt from generations of oppression. Perhaps he was drawn there. There are no answers as to what began worship of Mormo, or whether it was him that approached potential followers, or the followers that approached him. Most theologians believe, like other godlings, Mormo was appealed to, and found worshippers to his liking.

He wanders constantly, skulking from hidden den to hidden den, occasionally lurking near his shrines to gather sustenance and amusement from followers or merely unfortunate passers-by. Most of his plots involve ruining the plans of other beings of power, rather than concocting schemes of his own. He just prefers to see others fail. In fact, he avoids any grand schemes that are in any way likely to be noticed, because he prefers not to draw any attention to himself.

However, Mormo is very good at manipulating others to take a fall on his behalf. His preferred prey in this regard are people of particular talent or potential who are ostracized from society for whatever reason. In whispers and omens, he talks to them, swaying them to a course of action that will feed his voracious hunger, and probably ruin their own life in the process. Despite his reputation as a crude, brutal godling, Mormo is capable of tremendous cunning and subtlety, and he prefers to take a cautious approach in whatever he does. This can result in some convoluted plots, where a charismatic bandit leader is influenced by a canny but unstable shaman, who in turn 'divines' advice from a voice in the woods (a ghoul taking orders from Mormo, hiding).

Primarily, Mormo is interested in surviving. Garnering worship feeds him, but more importantly it supplies him with tools to use. He trusts no one, and assumes that, in their true heart, all other creatures are like him, and therefore would prey on him if they could. He knows that he is formidable, and far beyond the skill of most mortals to defeat, but he still takes no chances. He treats a mere farmer the same way he treats a great hero; he prefers to attack them when they are helpless.

Secondary to survival is his hunger. Mormo does not need to eat, but he is a miserable creature, and glutting himself on the agony of others just makes him feel better... at least for a while. The physical embodiment of this appetite is his habit of eating corpses, which is one reason he is affiliated with ghouls. In fact, Mormo himself can easily be mistaken for a normal ghoul of the undead variety (much to the horror of some very, very unfortunate monster hunters), and he often turns his priests into ghouls upon their death.

Mormo has a particular loathing for those who are spiritually minded. Priests and other religious figures are sure targets for him. He despises faith, for he sees it as a pathetic crutch for the weak, but he also hates the surety and harmony that it seems to create in people. These are things he does not have, and he wants to take them away from others. As noted, Mormo prefers to spoil or ruin what others have made, or what they believe in. He certainly regards love and faith as weakness to be preyed on, but the truth is that he is not happy, and he will never rest until the rest of the world is as unhappy and emptied out as he is. Until then, he'll continue creeping about the edges and preying on what he can.

As might be expected, Mormo has no true allies. There are a small number of unpleasant godlings who he works with on occasion, but he is otherwise universally hated by most faiths and organizations, even the evil ones. Mormo wouldn't have it any other way; hate is the only form of sincerity that he understands.

Cult of Mormo part 4
Cult of Mormo part 3
Cult of Mormo part 2
Cult of Mormo part 1

The Cult of Mormo, pt 4: Insider's Look

2008-02-28T13:58:00.000-08:00

Now that my players are finished smacking around the cult of Mormo, I'll post a lot they don't know, and a little that they do. I don't doubt that there will be some in-game research on the topic (just in case). From a design standpoint, these fellows were pretty much there to give Adun associates as bad as he was.

I'll emphasize that the cult of Mormo isn't the sort of thing that generates save-the-world plots. Though evocative in their own way, the stories they end up being part of are on a much smaller scale. In some respects, this makes them more personal as adversaries. Sometimes it is far easier for a group to get sympathetic about the capture of a single person than to work against the threat of a thousand people dying. Remember too that the cult of Mormo isn't likely to want to randomly off a thousand people. Somebody has to survive to suffer, after all. They prefer their work to be very, very personal. They aren't going to want to take over a town, say, rather than kidnap the mayor's son, do horrible things to him, cut off his nose and then send him home again.

In my campaign, the party discovered a rather large group of Mormo's followers. Later, they understood that this was quite unusual, and wondered just what the meeting was for (some reasons for that are revealed below). Last session, they discovered precisely why... someone else was recruiting, someone who had nothing to do with the cult of Mormo.

As it turns out, these sorts of cultists can make great fire-and-forget allies for the unscrupulous, so long as you keep an eye on them.

The cult of Mormo is a wide-scattered entity, with information about its rites and prayers transmitted to followers by Mormo's priests. These priests generally wander from shrine to shrine, pausing only to recruit new followers or plan some horrible offering. A few are called to watch over a shrine, and act as keepers of lore for the cult. These stationary priests are often the primary teachers of the cult, and they also have the unpleasant task of having to deal with Mormo himself when he happens by... which he might.

Becoming a priest of Mormo requires ruthlessness, an intensity of purpose, and either self-loathing or utter arrogance. Priests are ordained for their cunning, their expressions of hatred, and their capacity to needle secrets out of others. They must be concise in what they want from Mormo. Those without strong will or sense of purpose will forever hover at acolyte status, there to be used and abused by the priesthood.

An important facet of Mormo worship is Mormo's pact with his priests. He invests power in them in exchange for their service, but insists that their behavior is only what they want to do anyway. Mormo does not send specific orders, and he only has a small roster of tenets that he considers important to follow. It is implied that any of his priests may challenge him at any time, and that they may willfully disobey him if it suits their purposes. In fact, he expects it.

The iron fist within this threadbare glove is simple enough. Might makes right, and the priests know Mormo is far stronger than any of them. To challenge or disobey Mormo means one can expect a visit from him, and death would be the preferred outcome of such a visit. Few priests really know what it means to be Mormo's plaything, but none of them ever want to find out.
The basic tenets of Mormo's faith can be described as follows:

Love is forbidden in the faith of Mormo. If you love someone, you must hurt them or kill them. If someone loves you, you must use that to inflict great misery upon them, and then perhaps they will turn to Mormo to get revenge against you. In that way, they will become your ally.
Devotion is folly. Mormo offers concrete rewards, and asks only that you do what is natural to you. The more you make yourself strong, the more he will gift you with his power. He does not want worship, only food. You do not want to worship Mormo, you want to BE Mormo.
You are a monster. There is no right or wrong. Those who try to cling to right and wrong do so because it makes them feel powerful and protected. Nothing in the world can protect you except yourself.
Take joy in hurting the weak. It is what they are asking you to do, after all. The world is nothing more than the strong eating the weak. The weak submit and die. There is no reason to be merciful. All are your enemies, and they will do to you what you are doing to them, if they were stronger than you.
Some will attempt to convert you and make you redeem yourself or atone for your foul deeds. This is just a lie to bring you under their power. If you follow their rules, you become a pawn. Lie to them, instead, feign repentance and then betray them.
Some will attempt to capture you to bring you to justice. Justice is another stupidity to make the weak feel better about themselves. Kill them all, for they will certainly kill you if they get the chance.
Laugh at torture, when it comes from those not of Mormo. They only prove your faith by doing it to you.
If you are not cruel, you will fail.
Wreck and destroy what is loved. The strong will leave it behind, and understand the truth. The weak will weep and you will laugh at them. It is your right to torment those who are so stupid as to cling to these useless trappings.
Stay hidden. Being secret gives you more power. The more your prey does not know, the easier it is to do your will. Mormo wanders in the shadows, and he knows best. There are those who wish to destroy you, because they fear you. Do not give them the opportunity.
If you want greater favors from Mormo, you must pay for them. He gives nothing for free. He is an honest god.

Favor from Mormo and personal power are the only real measurements of hierarchy in the cult of Mormo. As a result, strife between priests is common, and murder within the cult's ranks can happen at any time. Though Mormo does not care, he makes a point of punishing such murderers if he happens to be nearby. On the other hand, promotion sometimes occurs with a particularly clever assassination. Most priests are solitary as a result, preferring only to keep ignorant pawns and properly subjugated acolytes.

However, on occasion, word spreads from shrine to shrine (usually through magical messages via beetles), that a Ghoulfeast will be had, and this means all priests and followers must find their way to one of the greater shrines, those places where Mormo himself might arrive. It is not mandatory to show up, but a Ghoulfeast is called by either the strongest of Mormo's priests or Mormo himself, and that means a chance to win great favor... or sometimes have a chance at that elusive priest you've been trying to kill for a while now. Ghoulfeasts are usually called when offerings of great intricacy are planned, when something affecting the cult as a whole is occurring, or Mormo has chosen to personally ordain a group of would-be priests. Either way, the area in which a Ghoulfeast occurs is sure to be rife with unpleasant crimes for a few weeks, as all the Mormo cultists attempt to gather favor.

Mormo has refined tastes. His worshipers are expected to produce offerings on a weekly basis, but these can be small, petty things, such as stolen holy symbols or temple alms filched from a collection. Such petty offerings need not be physical in nature, either; slanderous gossip to break up harmony, for example, can be offered to Mormo. Followers are expected to start with these, and include sacrifices of things loved or treasured by them. The more pain that is caused with sacrifices, the better Mormo enjoys it.

Greater offerings are much more severe. Priests of Mormo steal holy relics, deface idols, break up marriages, kidnap children, or perform terrible acts while masquerading as members of other religions. Blood sacrifice is quite acceptable, but mere death is not enough to satisfy Mormo's hunger. The death must cause great misery or betrayal to feed him, but those who can provide such meals to Mormo will have his favor.

Next up: Who IS this Mormo guy, anyway?

The Cult of Mormo, part 3
The Cult of Mormo, part 2
The Cult of Mormo, part 1

Meandering

2008-02-24T18:42:00.001-08:00

Next installment will be some insider information on Mormo and his followers. For now, I wanted to express smug satisfaction in watching a group of players sweat during a climactic encounter.

Did they catch Adun? Oh, yes, they killed him, but it wasn't easy. The canny dwarf spent time fortifying himself with magic while sending in successive waves of lackeys, and the party didn't see him at all until he blindsided the priest.... which hurt them, a lot. But eventually, they overcame the bandits, the corpse-men and the swarm-vomiting ghouls, and pulled Adun down.
It's always a wonderful thing to see the fire of accomplishment at the gaming table. My players left totally pumped up. They knew how close a fight it was, and they had some bad luck early on.

It is more than completion for this group, though. Having recently moved into level 11 (d20 3.5 DnD), the party is learning that they are no longer just local heroes, and that they are capable of making history instead of just living in it.

From a story standpoint, Adun's death represents the passage of the heroes into a new world. Adun was nasty, cunning and thoroughly evil, but he'd never be a threat on a grand scale. He was a terrible leader, relying entirely on fear and violence to get others to serve him, and he didn't have any vision beyond mere hurt, much like his patron. Next session, after they wrap up all the bloody loose ends Adun and his people left behind, they'll have completed a very long story arc, and can finally look forward without having to worry about what's behind them.

They have a lot to look forward to.

As a closing note, a good many people have asked me about 4th edition, and what I think about it. I'll let you know when it actually gets released, and I have a chance to take a good look. Until then, it isn't as if anyone is short on 3.5 material to use. I know I'm certainly not.

post scriptum: When the party rogue wants to crawl through ghoul burrows, don't let them do it. It's never a good idea.