Title: Not my best day ever.
Well, picking up from where we left off, we had 2 injured crew members and our beautiful ship was nose planted into the mud in the middle of what my dear mother would call "buttf*ck nowhere" on Higgin's Moon. We had yet to see combat.
Mercifully, the ship was alright, at least. And we had a quest! And, so far unknown to my players, they were about to come into possession of a ship. I made the mistake, once again, of having it all planned out: Kai was going to go talk to the robber gang, get killed (obviously), the crew would inherit the ship and all its mooing cargo, and would be able to go sell the cows and turn a tidy profit therefrom. If they were feeling really adventurous, I'd made the robbers stupid enough to have their camp rigged with mines, so all the crew would have to do is set off a few of them and the whole place would blow. The crew could then scavenge all sorts of goody from the rubble, including the pocketwatch quest item I'd set up last session, and no one would have to fire a shot. The session would be all character interaction, dialogue, spot checks, bartering, and figuring out what they wanted to do with their brand new ship.
The first part goes brilliantly. Everyone is on board for the decision Kai makes to go down and barter. I can see tension mount amongst the crew as the time narratively ticks by. Players are clearly starting to understand that this is a major hiccup, and, just as clearly, different crew members are having different reactions to the situation, forming different theories about what's now expected of them and where the story is going from here. However, unlike our first couple sessions, a pattern of leadership is apparent, and even a loose decision-making hierarchy among the crew. Awesome! Clearly people are settling into their characters. I am almost bursting with pride as Wren makes the call down to the bandit camp, nearly wriggling with self-congratulatory glee as I describe the bandits holding up the (obviously, to my mind) dead Kai. I do a quick mental inventory of all the clues I have set up about the explosives ringing the camp, the armaments of the ship, etc. I try not to look too pleased with myself.
And then they decided to mount a rescue mission.
I sat in mounting dread as characters with no gun or fighting skills whatsoever planned a full-on ground infiltration of what I had established as a well-planned camp of armed, murderous bandits. Between desperately asking my players whether they were SURE that they wanted to do this, and half-heartedly overseeing their lockpicking of the different armaments rooms on ship, I took stock of the situation. I had already given descriptions of the bandits in the tavern, and had established the red haired twins and the uber creepy brunette; I had them established as a 'band' of robbers, but hadn't specified how many of them there were - that was something, at least. Maybe I had some wiggle room there; and, after all, maybe Molly and Will would manage to sneak in to the camp. Afterall, the bandits would only really have sentries covering the road...
...the road that Molly and Will decide to walk straight down towards the camp.
Right. Ok. Fine. If that's how they want to play it, that's how we're going to play it.
So, obviously they get captured, and obviously they get taken to the headhonchos. I've realised by now that nothing will induce my crew to abandon my NPC Kai, so I decide to cut the apron strings and let Molly and Will get up close and personal with hard evidence of both the bad-ness of the predicament they're in and irrefutable proof of Kai's demise. I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy leading my players through the PTSD bunker. That's normal, though, right? Sure. Everyone feels like that.
While team 1 (Molly and Will) and team 2 (Wren, Todd, and Cale) are deciding what they should do, I decide on a strategy. Admittedly, it hinges pretty hard on being able to roll dice where my players can't see them, but given that we've all just started to settle into the campaign I really don't want this to result in a party-wipe. That being said, there's nothing to say it needs to be a cakewalk either. My players are set on having a bit of violence, I figure, may as well give them what they want. I jot some quick numbers for my baddies and let the fun begin.
In fairness to my players, I only need to fudge a couple rolls, and almost all of them are Cale taking care of the sentries ringing the camp. I might find some of my players methods (and choices) dubious, but they're all quick on their feet and fully involved in the story, and a good dozen rounds of combat go by in the blink of an eye. When team 2 finally manage to get Will and Molly clear, and they blast the camp to smithereens, there's a real sense of the victory being earned. No one remembers the pocket watch fetch quest, but it doesn't really matter.
My Big Damn Heroes collect their just reward from the office in Jaynestown and find the handy-dandy IOU plot points in the late Kai's desk. After a bit of in-character bickering, they decide to name their new ship after the situation which led to their possession of it: The Calamity.
I wholeheartedly agree.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Sunday, June 7, 2015
#7 Serenity Campaign Session Player Notes
Kale is cleaning the ship after being convinced that it would go faster if he does by Will. After Will has the conversation with the three who are at the Bael's, he goes and checks up on Kale who promptly falls on him.
Will breaks his leg and has a gash on his head.
Kale puts him into his deck chair and drags him away from the ship, after locking it up, and gets stopped by a driver, Schwishang in a food truck
The driver takes Kale and Will to a lady who does traditional and Chinese medicine. She rushes him in to take care of him. Kale is useless to tell her what is wrong with Will and she ushers him out.
Kale takes a rickshaw back to the ship.
Wren, Molly and Todd get back to the ship. They admire the cleanliness, and notice the stuff left out. Wren thinks its rude that the things were left out, Molly is concerned and looks for blood Todd notices the drag tracks. They go inside and call for Kale and Will. No answer.
Wren goes to check the cockpit and kitchen and main room. Nothing.
Molly sends Todd out to look for witnesses.
Molly goes to get some medical supplies.
Todd ignores Molly and follows the drag tracks which lead to tire tracks.
Todd looks around at other ships and goes to a neighbouring one after establishing that it doesn't look reaver esque
Todd finds a few people outside a ship eating. They ask if he's lost.
Todd is all optimism and gets a bit of info. They get suspicious and he leaves without giving his name. They call the authorities to tell them what is going on.
Wren checks the engine room, then their cabins. Nothing out of order in any.
Todd gets back and tells Molly about the van. And the phone call.
Molly sends Todd in to clean the blood. Molly calls Wren down to the door and she arrives when the organizer gets there, who sucks up again. Asks if Wren is alright and after assuring that she is, mentions that Todd should stay on the ship.
He leaves, the rickshaw with Kale arrives, and the driver waits for him to take him back.
Kale walks up to the ship and Molly pounces on him. She and Kale leave to go back on the rickshaw back to Suntient.
Todd gets rid of the blood and then goes to his plants. Wren goes to the cockpit.
Kale meets back up with Schwishang, they go to check out his motorcycle engine when Molly tells the men to leave. Molly and Schwishang's grandmother talk about Will.
Molly talks to Will, he mentions that he is getting too old for this and that they are to leave him on this planet.
Molly tries to talk him out of it, but eventually says goodbye.
Molly and the woman walk down into the restaurant to talk, they wait for an old man to finish his food. The grandma offers Molly food.
Kale and Schwishang look over the motorcycle. Talk engines. Talk about Schwishang's uncle and the fleet of ships he owns.
The old man finishes his meal and comes over. Mentions that he knows about the ship and says he has a job.
Molly mentions they are already in a job and the man says that he understands that and that he's sure the Bael business won't take more than two weeks so after that we could come back and take the job.
He mentions that the job is taking some things off planet to another planet. Molly didn't ask questions.
Molly goes and badly plays Maajong.
She meets up with Kale and mentions Will leaving. They go with Schwishang to go and check out the guards that will be on their mission in two weeks. They meet Schwishang's father, Laoshe.
He mentions that the shipment is people, but it is a legal shipment. He says that the bodyguards are for the people getting transported. He mentions his ship, the Empress.
Schwishang drives Kale and Molly to the Empress to meet the new crew members. He mentions that the people they are to be transporting are monks.
They get to the Empress, which is shiny and pretty. The door opens and new people walk in.
Sudo Kent saunters through the doorway, much to Kale's growing happiness. He notices that Sudo has a rifle in one hand and is wearing a mechanical belt and starts geeking out.
Lanju also enters, he seems nice, portly. He is 34.
Quai-sai has an awesome sense of humour in that he doesn't have any.
They interact with each other, get to know each other a little bit better.
Kale and Molly get a ride back with Schwishang, who gets invited in the ship, much to Wren's chagrin. Kale and Schwishang go to the engine room, Wren tries to follow to make sure everything is fine, Molly intercepts her and they argue about the current plan of attack, which is for Wren to go with Kale and two of the soldiers into the shady parts of town to search for signs of Jon Snow. Wren eventually comes around to the idea. Molly will be giving Wren as much info beforehand as possible.
After the conversation Wren goes and checks on the boys in the engine room. Thankfully, they seem to be basking in the glory of the engine, not taking it apart.
Schwishang says he can help with the communication between Molly and Wren for the day. Wren thanks the strange man who she doesn't know, but who seems to respect her and she responds to that.
Notes Taken By Ash.
Will breaks his leg and has a gash on his head.
Kale puts him into his deck chair and drags him away from the ship, after locking it up, and gets stopped by a driver, Schwishang in a food truck
The driver takes Kale and Will to a lady who does traditional and Chinese medicine. She rushes him in to take care of him. Kale is useless to tell her what is wrong with Will and she ushers him out.
Kale takes a rickshaw back to the ship.
Wren, Molly and Todd get back to the ship. They admire the cleanliness, and notice the stuff left out. Wren thinks its rude that the things were left out, Molly is concerned and looks for blood Todd notices the drag tracks. They go inside and call for Kale and Will. No answer.
Wren goes to check the cockpit and kitchen and main room. Nothing.
Molly sends Todd out to look for witnesses.
Molly goes to get some medical supplies.
Todd ignores Molly and follows the drag tracks which lead to tire tracks.
Todd looks around at other ships and goes to a neighbouring one after establishing that it doesn't look reaver esque
Todd finds a few people outside a ship eating. They ask if he's lost.
Todd is all optimism and gets a bit of info. They get suspicious and he leaves without giving his name. They call the authorities to tell them what is going on.
Wren checks the engine room, then their cabins. Nothing out of order in any.
Todd gets back and tells Molly about the van. And the phone call.
Molly sends Todd in to clean the blood. Molly calls Wren down to the door and she arrives when the organizer gets there, who sucks up again. Asks if Wren is alright and after assuring that she is, mentions that Todd should stay on the ship.
He leaves, the rickshaw with Kale arrives, and the driver waits for him to take him back.
Kale walks up to the ship and Molly pounces on him. She and Kale leave to go back on the rickshaw back to Suntient.
Todd gets rid of the blood and then goes to his plants. Wren goes to the cockpit.
Kale meets back up with Schwishang, they go to check out his motorcycle engine when Molly tells the men to leave. Molly and Schwishang's grandmother talk about Will.
Molly talks to Will, he mentions that he is getting too old for this and that they are to leave him on this planet.
Molly tries to talk him out of it, but eventually says goodbye.
Molly and the woman walk down into the restaurant to talk, they wait for an old man to finish his food. The grandma offers Molly food.
Kale and Schwishang look over the motorcycle. Talk engines. Talk about Schwishang's uncle and the fleet of ships he owns.
The old man finishes his meal and comes over. Mentions that he knows about the ship and says he has a job.
Molly mentions they are already in a job and the man says that he understands that and that he's sure the Bael business won't take more than two weeks so after that we could come back and take the job.
He mentions that the job is taking some things off planet to another planet. Molly didn't ask questions.
Molly goes and badly plays Maajong.
She meets up with Kale and mentions Will leaving. They go with Schwishang to go and check out the guards that will be on their mission in two weeks. They meet Schwishang's father, Laoshe.
He mentions that the shipment is people, but it is a legal shipment. He says that the bodyguards are for the people getting transported. He mentions his ship, the Empress.
Schwishang drives Kale and Molly to the Empress to meet the new crew members. He mentions that the people they are to be transporting are monks.
They get to the Empress, which is shiny and pretty. The door opens and new people walk in.
Sudo Kent saunters through the doorway, much to Kale's growing happiness. He notices that Sudo has a rifle in one hand and is wearing a mechanical belt and starts geeking out.
Lanju also enters, he seems nice, portly. He is 34.
Quai-sai has an awesome sense of humour in that he doesn't have any.
They interact with each other, get to know each other a little bit better.
Kale and Molly get a ride back with Schwishang, who gets invited in the ship, much to Wren's chagrin. Kale and Schwishang go to the engine room, Wren tries to follow to make sure everything is fine, Molly intercepts her and they argue about the current plan of attack, which is for Wren to go with Kale and two of the soldiers into the shady parts of town to search for signs of Jon Snow. Wren eventually comes around to the idea. Molly will be giving Wren as much info beforehand as possible.
After the conversation Wren goes and checks on the boys in the engine room. Thankfully, they seem to be basking in the glory of the engine, not taking it apart.
Schwishang says he can help with the communication between Molly and Wren for the day. Wren thanks the strange man who she doesn't know, but who seems to respect her and she responds to that.
Notes Taken By Ash.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
#5 Serenity Campaign Session Player Notes
So, this is a bit of a cheat because no one actually *took* notes on session 5. Suffice to say, though, that it was mostly sleuthing on Verbena in the old Snow house.
In there, they found some tantalising evidence and a lot of sad family history. The story, as they were able to piece it together through broken crockery, empty rooms, a whole mess of dust, and one very interesting digital recording, is essentially this:
John Snow is the man who owed the late Kai 21,000 credits. John Snow lived in an awful fancy house on a backwater planet thanks to being a handsome rascal and marrying rich; specifically, the sweet Arabella Bael, daughter of none other than Jensen Bael, Manager of the Hao Yun Blue Sun Factory. Daddy dear was never much a fan of Johnny boy, though he could never refuse his only child anything she set her mind on; so, when she insisted on marrying John, Jensen set up his son-in-law on nice, quiet, distraction-less Verbena working at the Alliance armaments plant and hoped for the best.
All was well for a good spell of time, until John scored an off world business trip, and wouldn't you know it? Immediately sidetracked into the old distractions that his father in law had hoped to keep him away from, and burned a nice tidy hole in the family fortune while he was at it. Good thing Kai was on hand to bail him out - for a price. Only downside - besides a 21,000 credit IOU - is that while John was away, Riddick, the eldest of John and Arabella's 2 boys, got old enough to turn browncoat, and helped blow up the Alliance gun factory, perishing heroically in the doing.
After John got back to Verbena, it was all downhill... No more job, a child dead, and a sudden lack of financial security sent Arabella begging to her daddy, who just about snapped his crackers at hearing all the money had evaporated from his daughter's dowry, and he informed poor sweet Arabella of her husbands more... "exotic" extracurricular activities and begged her to hurry home.
Which she did, a couple thrown vases later.
The youngest (and only remaining) kid, Tomjon, stayed on with his dad and tried to help him make a go of things. Instead he learned the hardest lesson any boy can learn about his father: that he's a useless, shallow wastrel. Been probably about a year now, as such things are reckoned, that Tomjon took off after his mom. No one really knows for sure what happened to Handsome John after that, but from the look of the farm equipment, he certainly hasn't been on Verbena farmsteading.
In there, they found some tantalising evidence and a lot of sad family history. The story, as they were able to piece it together through broken crockery, empty rooms, a whole mess of dust, and one very interesting digital recording, is essentially this:
John Snow is the man who owed the late Kai 21,000 credits. John Snow lived in an awful fancy house on a backwater planet thanks to being a handsome rascal and marrying rich; specifically, the sweet Arabella Bael, daughter of none other than Jensen Bael, Manager of the Hao Yun Blue Sun Factory. Daddy dear was never much a fan of Johnny boy, though he could never refuse his only child anything she set her mind on; so, when she insisted on marrying John, Jensen set up his son-in-law on nice, quiet, distraction-less Verbena working at the Alliance armaments plant and hoped for the best.
All was well for a good spell of time, until John scored an off world business trip, and wouldn't you know it? Immediately sidetracked into the old distractions that his father in law had hoped to keep him away from, and burned a nice tidy hole in the family fortune while he was at it. Good thing Kai was on hand to bail him out - for a price. Only downside - besides a 21,000 credit IOU - is that while John was away, Riddick, the eldest of John and Arabella's 2 boys, got old enough to turn browncoat, and helped blow up the Alliance gun factory, perishing heroically in the doing.
After John got back to Verbena, it was all downhill... No more job, a child dead, and a sudden lack of financial security sent Arabella begging to her daddy, who just about snapped his crackers at hearing all the money had evaporated from his daughter's dowry, and he informed poor sweet Arabella of her husbands more... "exotic" extracurricular activities and begged her to hurry home.
Which she did, a couple thrown vases later.
The youngest (and only remaining) kid, Tomjon, stayed on with his dad and tried to help him make a go of things. Instead he learned the hardest lesson any boy can learn about his father: that he's a useless, shallow wastrel. Been probably about a year now, as such things are reckoned, that Tomjon took off after his mom. No one really knows for sure what happened to Handsome John after that, but from the look of the farm equipment, he certainly hasn't been on Verbena farmsteading.
#6 Serenity Campaign Session Player Notes
On our way to New Dunsmere, the capitol of Beaumonde
On this planet Molly goes by Debbie Jenkins
Nice city, similar to LA in terms of pollution, Calamity is the worse looking ship but not by much
Got Todd cleared to exit the ship
Will and Kale stay behind to get fuel, food
Connection to guy checking us in- know's Wren's uncle, Rhys. Got us a connection to find Bael
Driven out to an area in the country to a nice establishment
Talked to the secretary of Bael. Set up a meeting at 1400 at the Toll Booth cafe tomorrow
Exploring the fancy neighbourhood!
Traveled through a fence to find strawberries growing up a hill
Traveled further in to find blackberries
Keep traveling up the hill to find fancy bushes, roses, etc.
Keep traveling and start to feel discomfort. Todd and Wren feel flush, Molly feels like she needs to find a washroom pronto.
Come across a pond by a building. Molly drinks the water, Todd and Wren don't. Wren sits in the shade, Todd is playing in the cattails. Molly sits on the buildings steps.
Todd learns that the building is the New Dunsmere Fergusen Water Treatment and Chemical Disposal Rejuvenation Area
Molly did a medical check with us and gave us rehydration pills
Molly checked out that the chemicals won't do us harm
Wren had a hypochondriac attack and wanted more pills- Molly didn't give them to her
They walked back down to the Bael residence to wait for a ride back to the ship
Got harassed by a security guard while waiting in the shade behind the residence and Wren pulled rank on him- got them in to the guest house to freshen up before dinner with the Bael's
Washed clothing and showers before the dinner
Wren arranged for a ride back to their ship after dinner at the residence
Dinner happens, Wren feels embarrassed by her companions' eating styles, the Bael's ignore it
Todd is sent away to look at the gardens as business is broached
Molly gives Arabelle back the photo albums. Her son eagerly takes them
Molly explains why we are here and tells them that Jon is on the planet
Arabelle can't handle this and leaves
Bael and Molly discuss the fact that we know Jon is on the planet
Bael asks the crew to do some reconnaissance work to find Jon before he gets to the Bael residence to contact Arabelle
Bael offers us double the amount that Jon owes Kai to learn where he lives
The three head back to the ship
On this planet Molly goes by Debbie Jenkins
Nice city, similar to LA in terms of pollution, Calamity is the worse looking ship but not by much
Got Todd cleared to exit the ship
Will and Kale stay behind to get fuel, food
Connection to guy checking us in- know's Wren's uncle, Rhys. Got us a connection to find Bael
Driven out to an area in the country to a nice establishment
Talked to the secretary of Bael. Set up a meeting at 1400 at the Toll Booth cafe tomorrow
Exploring the fancy neighbourhood!
Traveled through a fence to find strawberries growing up a hill
Traveled further in to find blackberries
Keep traveling up the hill to find fancy bushes, roses, etc.
Keep traveling and start to feel discomfort. Todd and Wren feel flush, Molly feels like she needs to find a washroom pronto.
Come across a pond by a building. Molly drinks the water, Todd and Wren don't. Wren sits in the shade, Todd is playing in the cattails. Molly sits on the buildings steps.
Todd learns that the building is the New Dunsmere Fergusen Water Treatment and Chemical Disposal Rejuvenation Area
Molly did a medical check with us and gave us rehydration pills
Molly checked out that the chemicals won't do us harm
Wren had a hypochondriac attack and wanted more pills- Molly didn't give them to her
They walked back down to the Bael residence to wait for a ride back to the ship
Got harassed by a security guard while waiting in the shade behind the residence and Wren pulled rank on him- got them in to the guest house to freshen up before dinner with the Bael's
Washed clothing and showers before the dinner
Wren arranged for a ride back to their ship after dinner at the residence
Dinner happens, Wren feels embarrassed by her companions' eating styles, the Bael's ignore it
Todd is sent away to look at the gardens as business is broached
Molly gives Arabelle back the photo albums. Her son eagerly takes them
Molly explains why we are here and tells them that Jon is on the planet
Arabelle can't handle this and leaves
Bael and Molly discuss the fact that we know Jon is on the planet
Bael asks the crew to do some reconnaissance work to find Jon before he gets to the Bael residence to contact Arabelle
Bael offers us double the amount that Jon owes Kai to learn where he lives
The three head back to the ship
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
#3 Serenity Campaign Session GM Notes
Title: ...out of a clear, blue sky.
I freely admit: I was feeling a little cocky after the relative success of the previous 2 sessions. I thought I was really starting to get a handle on this whole GM thing, and that the hard part (getting the players together and moving) was over; from now on, they'd start playing the main roles and I would just be filling in details and providing boundaries.
I knew exactly what was going to happen this session, and for once I'd actually tried to do my homework on the system. We were going to land on Higgin's Moon, but the contact wasn't going to be there; instead, Kai would have to haggle with a new guy, and he wasn't going to agree to do anything unless Kai and the crew went and took out some robbers who were in the area screwing things up for everybody. If they went to the town they'd be able to pick up a sidequest that would get them some extra cash and prizes, but if they went straight out to look for the robbers they'd find them, Kai would go down to negotiate and conveniently get killed, the crew could nuke the site from orbit, take the ship, and continue on their merry way with some fun-fun-fun tidbits scattered around the ship to give them a little direction. Next session we'd be on another world, with none of my squishy, non-combat players ever needing to damage their hitpoints. Great!
Ha.
Things went wrong almost immediately. Kai had barely started haggling with the new contact before Will got carried away and levelled a gun at him, which naturally soured the deal and the new guy took off into the woods (and safety). So much for that part of the storyline, or, you know, Will 'not liking violence'. Mercifully, this meant the crew now HAD to go to the town, where they learned about the robbers in the woods. They also 100% talked to the sidequest guy in the bar, but then essentially forgot all about it. Oh well.
So, armed with info and finally on their way, they head off to find the robbers. As I'm writing this and looking back on all the sessions we've now had, I'm starting to realise that my group plays far more aggressively than you'd think their characters would allow. I mean, we have all these squishy, non-violent, non-weapon-using folks, and instead of playing like sleuths and con men and diplomats and pickpockets, they play like freaking tanks, charging towards the issue in the most direct way possible. Odd. Oh well.
Anyway, back to the session. I felt like our pilot, Wren, wasn't really getting able to role play a lot compared to the other characters, and the next section of the story called for the party to be sort of skimming over the tops of trees looking for the robber camp - perfect time to get her to do some rolling and some role playing, right? This is where I learned Note to Self #2: Don't get a character to roll on any action you don't want to open up to failure. Oh well.
And, of course, no good ship nosedive is complete unless several characters get injured in the crash. In our case, of course, the most severely injured character was also our medical expert, because, really, why would you even expect anything else ever. So, what I had imagined to be a nice, clean little session full of sleuthing, haggling, and intrigue, immediately dissolved into damage control, and the last half of the session was spent frantically tending to the wounded and assessing ship damage (luckily Higgin's Moon is known for its nice, impact absorbing mud). My pilot got to role play, all right, as the rest of the crew took turns yelling at her, and the bulk of the die rolling was done by our mangled healer, Molly. An interesting and memorable session, certainly, but definitely not quite what I'd imagined. Note to self #3:
Oh well.
I freely admit: I was feeling a little cocky after the relative success of the previous 2 sessions. I thought I was really starting to get a handle on this whole GM thing, and that the hard part (getting the players together and moving) was over; from now on, they'd start playing the main roles and I would just be filling in details and providing boundaries.
I knew exactly what was going to happen this session, and for once I'd actually tried to do my homework on the system. We were going to land on Higgin's Moon, but the contact wasn't going to be there; instead, Kai would have to haggle with a new guy, and he wasn't going to agree to do anything unless Kai and the crew went and took out some robbers who were in the area screwing things up for everybody. If they went to the town they'd be able to pick up a sidequest that would get them some extra cash and prizes, but if they went straight out to look for the robbers they'd find them, Kai would go down to negotiate and conveniently get killed, the crew could nuke the site from orbit, take the ship, and continue on their merry way with some fun-fun-fun tidbits scattered around the ship to give them a little direction. Next session we'd be on another world, with none of my squishy, non-combat players ever needing to damage their hitpoints. Great!
Ha.
Things went wrong almost immediately. Kai had barely started haggling with the new contact before Will got carried away and levelled a gun at him, which naturally soured the deal and the new guy took off into the woods (and safety). So much for that part of the storyline, or, you know, Will 'not liking violence'. Mercifully, this meant the crew now HAD to go to the town, where they learned about the robbers in the woods. They also 100% talked to the sidequest guy in the bar, but then essentially forgot all about it. Oh well.
So, armed with info and finally on their way, they head off to find the robbers. As I'm writing this and looking back on all the sessions we've now had, I'm starting to realise that my group plays far more aggressively than you'd think their characters would allow. I mean, we have all these squishy, non-violent, non-weapon-using folks, and instead of playing like sleuths and con men and diplomats and pickpockets, they play like freaking tanks, charging towards the issue in the most direct way possible. Odd. Oh well.
Anyway, back to the session. I felt like our pilot, Wren, wasn't really getting able to role play a lot compared to the other characters, and the next section of the story called for the party to be sort of skimming over the tops of trees looking for the robber camp - perfect time to get her to do some rolling and some role playing, right? This is where I learned Note to Self #2: Don't get a character to roll on any action you don't want to open up to failure. Oh well.
And, of course, no good ship nosedive is complete unless several characters get injured in the crash. In our case, of course, the most severely injured character was also our medical expert, because, really, why would you even expect anything else ever. So, what I had imagined to be a nice, clean little session full of sleuthing, haggling, and intrigue, immediately dissolved into damage control, and the last half of the session was spent frantically tending to the wounded and assessing ship damage (luckily Higgin's Moon is known for its nice, impact absorbing mud). My pilot got to role play, all right, as the rest of the crew took turns yelling at her, and the bulk of the die rolling was done by our mangled healer, Molly. An interesting and memorable session, certainly, but definitely not quite what I'd imagined. Note to self #3:
Oh well.
Wednesday, February 11, 2015
#2 Serenity Campaign Session GM Notes
Title: Fly, my little fledglings, FLY!
A thing I've heard from a lot of the other GM's I know is that a big part of the role you play as GM is "reading your group", both as individual character niches / player styles, and, perhaps most importantly, how the whole mish-mash functions together as a team.
I noticed in the first session that my group didn't really have any brassy, instantly-take-charge types. There were a couple naturally more passive types (I don't think anyone would have bought a 10 year old character trying to be party leader), and I thought I could see where leadership would eventually come from once people settled more into their roles, but for the first few sessions, at least, it didn't really make sense for any of the characters (from a role-playing standpoint) to put themselves forward.
Now, in a more established campaign this wouldn't have been an issue, because people would already have developed the necessary bonds with each other to keep everyone in mostly the same place going in mostly the same direction. However, this party was just starting out, so I felt like a leader/catalyst was important.
My original idea was, I gotta admit, very heavily based on the 'choose your own adventure' books from back in the day. It always annoyed me when GM's herded characters around like sheep instead of letting us figure things out on our own, so I figured the best way to avoid that would be to develop a series of "proto plots", stagger them around the confined area I'd managed to wrangle my characters into, and then see what they chose.
This turned out to be a really rewarding exercise in and of itself, and I'd definitely recommend it to any GM's who are keen to start but don't really have any solid idea of what they want their campaign to consist of. Essentially what I did was come up with a series of story beginnings; one of them, actually, was in the last session where the Alliance stopped the shuttle the party was on in order to make way for one of their military ships. But none of my players seemed particularly interested in that situation, so I turfed it and focused my energy on creating story beginnings that could be 'triggered' by my players talking to specific NPC's in the hiring fair. To make sure that everyone ended up on the same quest instead of going to all different ones, I decided that once the first event was 'triggered', that is, once an individual player had decided to follow a specific lead, I would allow myself to 'turn off' the events if I felt that was appropriate. Basically, first come, first served.
Story fragment number one, I decided, would be triggered by the players going over to the garbage company, United Reclamation, booth at the hiring fair. This company was a large enough size to be looking for several different posts, I decided. Will, Molly, and Wren would all make good impressions on the company spokesperson, and because Todd was tied to Molly, and Cale had stuck himself to Wren, that would pretty well take care of everyone. Once they were all on a ship, things could happen to bring them back to the Alliance storyline I'd pseudo-introduced in the first session.
Story fragment number two would be a macguffin, specifically, a shipment that a courier company had had stolen from them on route to delivery. I decided that once a player walked up to the table, the front man would be only grudgingly interested but would be interrupted suddenly by a subbordinate saying that one of their ships was damaged and its cargo taken, and that the crew was injured and would not be able to pursue this immediately. Being unwilling to involve the authorities for his own reasons, and not having sufficient crew to man their remaining ship, the front man would then have almost no choice but to employ some mercenary-minded individuals to help retrieve the stolen cargo.
Story fragment number three, and the one that ended up being chosen, was The Mysterious Stranger. A mysterious, no nonsense woman with a ship and a quest who wanted a crew that wouldn't ask questions. She, of course, would die soon into the quest and conveniently leave the party with a ship and a bunch of mysteries they could solve for fun and profit, but, like the other 2 story beginnings mentioned above, would provide the necessary (if temporary) direction and leadership to mold the fledgling party into a cohesive team.
Each of the story beginnings above depended on a player actively going and talking to a specific person. I even staggered the event triggers around the space station so that the most 'urgent' one, #2, was in the far corner from the entrance and the players would have to pass the other event triggers to get to it. As a final backup, though, I decided there would be a 4th story fragment, one that couldn't ignored or walked by - a disaster. I figured, if it came to a point where all my players were wandering around the station being bored and disparate, one of Vera's Chop Shop ships up there for display could explode and funnel everyone into another ship for the evacuation. Once everyone was together, the ship would tragically suffer a navigational malfunction and the crew would end up landing only spitting distance away from the locale of the Alliance-centric storyline I'd originally envisaged.
As I mentioned, it was story fragment #3 that ended up being triggered first, just by virtue of what direction the party members started moving around the station. Cale and Wren went to the left and only spoke to a couple 'dummy' booths before taking off to look at ships, and Will had gone straight to the canteen. Molly and Todd, on the other hand, had gone right and, after hitting a couple dummy booths on that side had triggered the Mysterious Stranger event. Now, I hadn't really put too much planning into this event, besides 'mysterious stranger who will conveniently die and leave them with a ship', but Molly and Todd both leapt at this storyline and I obligingly 'shut off' the other event triggers and let everyone collect sort of naturally in the ship. I had to sort of ad lib a primary quest - I figured I should make it a "simple job that somehow goes sideways" type thing cus otherwise it'd be either too dangerous to sign up for or too boring to make an engaging campaign - and because I was mostly pulling names out of the air, the primary quest became an under-the-table cattle drop to Higgin's Moon, and within a matter of minutes my players were a group on one ship with one united mission. End of session 2!
For me, the big value in going the 'story fragment' route was that it helped me flesh out the universe I was creating for my players without getting a) too bogged down in details, or b) too attached to a storyline that my players had no enthusiasm for. Coming up with a series of different stories meant I had to develop different characters and different roles, and think of different methods to make my goals happen, all within the same universe. This meant that, again, my characters got to wander around and act and do things on their own without me having to narrate their decisions to them, AND I got the added benefit of having created a small database of stock characters/roles/events that fit into my universe that I could draw on later down the road.
In terms of the final effect of the group following The Mysterious Stranger, its main strength and its main weakness was the introduction of an NPC to take the leadership role. This was helpful because it herded the different characters onto a ship and assigned them roles on that ship; it gave them a united purpose as well as a group leader who everyone trusted to make decisions on everyone's behalf; and it kept everyone more or less together. However, and this is another reason this character had to die, it also gave the players an easy way out of developing problem solving or leadership skills of their own, and because it was me, the GM, talking for the NPC, it felt way too much like I was running the campaign and prescribing actions for the players to take. Essentially, it was like I was writing the story and then narrating it, and just feeding the characters lines instead of them being able to take a couple plot points and write their own story.
So, yeah. The Mysterious Stranger bit was fun while it lasted, but Kai Had To Die. It was just a question of how.
A thing I've heard from a lot of the other GM's I know is that a big part of the role you play as GM is "reading your group", both as individual character niches / player styles, and, perhaps most importantly, how the whole mish-mash functions together as a team.
I noticed in the first session that my group didn't really have any brassy, instantly-take-charge types. There were a couple naturally more passive types (I don't think anyone would have bought a 10 year old character trying to be party leader), and I thought I could see where leadership would eventually come from once people settled more into their roles, but for the first few sessions, at least, it didn't really make sense for any of the characters (from a role-playing standpoint) to put themselves forward.
Now, in a more established campaign this wouldn't have been an issue, because people would already have developed the necessary bonds with each other to keep everyone in mostly the same place going in mostly the same direction. However, this party was just starting out, so I felt like a leader/catalyst was important.
My original idea was, I gotta admit, very heavily based on the 'choose your own adventure' books from back in the day. It always annoyed me when GM's herded characters around like sheep instead of letting us figure things out on our own, so I figured the best way to avoid that would be to develop a series of "proto plots", stagger them around the confined area I'd managed to wrangle my characters into, and then see what they chose.
This turned out to be a really rewarding exercise in and of itself, and I'd definitely recommend it to any GM's who are keen to start but don't really have any solid idea of what they want their campaign to consist of. Essentially what I did was come up with a series of story beginnings; one of them, actually, was in the last session where the Alliance stopped the shuttle the party was on in order to make way for one of their military ships. But none of my players seemed particularly interested in that situation, so I turfed it and focused my energy on creating story beginnings that could be 'triggered' by my players talking to specific NPC's in the hiring fair. To make sure that everyone ended up on the same quest instead of going to all different ones, I decided that once the first event was 'triggered', that is, once an individual player had decided to follow a specific lead, I would allow myself to 'turn off' the events if I felt that was appropriate. Basically, first come, first served.
Story fragment number one, I decided, would be triggered by the players going over to the garbage company, United Reclamation, booth at the hiring fair. This company was a large enough size to be looking for several different posts, I decided. Will, Molly, and Wren would all make good impressions on the company spokesperson, and because Todd was tied to Molly, and Cale had stuck himself to Wren, that would pretty well take care of everyone. Once they were all on a ship, things could happen to bring them back to the Alliance storyline I'd pseudo-introduced in the first session.
Story fragment number two would be a macguffin, specifically, a shipment that a courier company had had stolen from them on route to delivery. I decided that once a player walked up to the table, the front man would be only grudgingly interested but would be interrupted suddenly by a subbordinate saying that one of their ships was damaged and its cargo taken, and that the crew was injured and would not be able to pursue this immediately. Being unwilling to involve the authorities for his own reasons, and not having sufficient crew to man their remaining ship, the front man would then have almost no choice but to employ some mercenary-minded individuals to help retrieve the stolen cargo.
Story fragment number three, and the one that ended up being chosen, was The Mysterious Stranger. A mysterious, no nonsense woman with a ship and a quest who wanted a crew that wouldn't ask questions. She, of course, would die soon into the quest and conveniently leave the party with a ship and a bunch of mysteries they could solve for fun and profit, but, like the other 2 story beginnings mentioned above, would provide the necessary (if temporary) direction and leadership to mold the fledgling party into a cohesive team.
Each of the story beginnings above depended on a player actively going and talking to a specific person. I even staggered the event triggers around the space station so that the most 'urgent' one, #2, was in the far corner from the entrance and the players would have to pass the other event triggers to get to it. As a final backup, though, I decided there would be a 4th story fragment, one that couldn't ignored or walked by - a disaster. I figured, if it came to a point where all my players were wandering around the station being bored and disparate, one of Vera's Chop Shop ships up there for display could explode and funnel everyone into another ship for the evacuation. Once everyone was together, the ship would tragically suffer a navigational malfunction and the crew would end up landing only spitting distance away from the locale of the Alliance-centric storyline I'd originally envisaged.
As I mentioned, it was story fragment #3 that ended up being triggered first, just by virtue of what direction the party members started moving around the station. Cale and Wren went to the left and only spoke to a couple 'dummy' booths before taking off to look at ships, and Will had gone straight to the canteen. Molly and Todd, on the other hand, had gone right and, after hitting a couple dummy booths on that side had triggered the Mysterious Stranger event. Now, I hadn't really put too much planning into this event, besides 'mysterious stranger who will conveniently die and leave them with a ship', but Molly and Todd both leapt at this storyline and I obligingly 'shut off' the other event triggers and let everyone collect sort of naturally in the ship. I had to sort of ad lib a primary quest - I figured I should make it a "simple job that somehow goes sideways" type thing cus otherwise it'd be either too dangerous to sign up for or too boring to make an engaging campaign - and because I was mostly pulling names out of the air, the primary quest became an under-the-table cattle drop to Higgin's Moon, and within a matter of minutes my players were a group on one ship with one united mission. End of session 2!
For me, the big value in going the 'story fragment' route was that it helped me flesh out the universe I was creating for my players without getting a) too bogged down in details, or b) too attached to a storyline that my players had no enthusiasm for. Coming up with a series of different stories meant I had to develop different characters and different roles, and think of different methods to make my goals happen, all within the same universe. This meant that, again, my characters got to wander around and act and do things on their own without me having to narrate their decisions to them, AND I got the added benefit of having created a small database of stock characters/roles/events that fit into my universe that I could draw on later down the road.
In terms of the final effect of the group following The Mysterious Stranger, its main strength and its main weakness was the introduction of an NPC to take the leadership role. This was helpful because it herded the different characters onto a ship and assigned them roles on that ship; it gave them a united purpose as well as a group leader who everyone trusted to make decisions on everyone's behalf; and it kept everyone more or less together. However, and this is another reason this character had to die, it also gave the players an easy way out of developing problem solving or leadership skills of their own, and because it was me, the GM, talking for the NPC, it felt way too much like I was running the campaign and prescribing actions for the players to take. Essentially, it was like I was writing the story and then narrating it, and just feeding the characters lines instead of them being able to take a couple plot points and write their own story.
So, yeah. The Mysterious Stranger bit was fun while it lasted, but Kai Had To Die. It was just a question of how.
Monday, February 9, 2015
#1 Serenity Campaign Session GM notes
Title: A promising start.
It's a player-driven campaign system, I thought. Just get the players to give you their character ideas and it'll be super easy to just weave them into a beautiful 'choose your own adventure' style campaign narrative, I thought. I'll just supply some macguffins, a couple stock bad guy archetypes, and colour in the backgrounds (so to speak) and the players will take care of the rest!
WRONG.
My awesome happy fun time ride of fantasy experienced its first bit of turbulence when my players sent me their character ideas... and not a single person mentioned being able to use a weapon. Don't get me wrong, the characters were all cool, unique ideas, complete with special talents, a hint of backstory, and chock-full of delicious gameplay-enhancing personality. But NO ONE even MENTIONED being able to use a gun, or having a history as a soldier or mercenary... Not even being able to throw a punch! These people were so far away from a Jayne or a Zoe that they came out the other side. Seriously, a petty thief, a spoiled city girl, a skinny nerd, and a freaking 10 year old, and then the one guy who kind of at least sounded like he SHOULD be able to hold his own specifically included in his description that he was non-violent. Le sigh.
So, Note to Self #1: Zelda, not World of Warcraft. I was going to need to focus on detective work and puzzle solving rather than 'random encounters' - or even being chased by mysteriously violent mysterious bad guys - to move the plot along.
I decided for the beginner session to focus more on putting all the disparate characters into a roughly believable setting and situation, one where I wouldn't need to handwave too much shared backstory among them but which would naturally funnel them all into running into each other naturally. So where would this weird bunch of miscreants all looking for a new ship end up? Well, on Beylix, of course, home of the DIY ship for cheap. Once I'd decided on that, it wasn't too much of a stretch to come up with an event that would be sure to draw our ragtag bunch together: a junker's hiring fair complete with ships for sale. Vera's Chop Shop was born.
In the end, I did handwave Molly and Todd knowing each other, and sort of "placed" Cale and Wren where I needed them to be, but all in all I'm still slightly proud of how this first session went. The players got to play their characters and make decisions, but because the 'prize' I'd invented (the chop shop job fair) was big enough, the decision to go there was still essentially theirs. They all came together from different areas, they all had a reason to interact with each other and test out their character-acting chops, and by the time the session ended we had 5 characters in the same place at the same time for roughly the same purpose - without me having to narrate to them what I needed them to do. Not bad for a first try, right?
It's a player-driven campaign system, I thought. Just get the players to give you their character ideas and it'll be super easy to just weave them into a beautiful 'choose your own adventure' style campaign narrative, I thought. I'll just supply some macguffins, a couple stock bad guy archetypes, and colour in the backgrounds (so to speak) and the players will take care of the rest!
WRONG.
My awesome happy fun time ride of fantasy experienced its first bit of turbulence when my players sent me their character ideas... and not a single person mentioned being able to use a weapon. Don't get me wrong, the characters were all cool, unique ideas, complete with special talents, a hint of backstory, and chock-full of delicious gameplay-enhancing personality. But NO ONE even MENTIONED being able to use a gun, or having a history as a soldier or mercenary... Not even being able to throw a punch! These people were so far away from a Jayne or a Zoe that they came out the other side. Seriously, a petty thief, a spoiled city girl, a skinny nerd, and a freaking 10 year old, and then the one guy who kind of at least sounded like he SHOULD be able to hold his own specifically included in his description that he was non-violent. Le sigh.
So, Note to Self #1: Zelda, not World of Warcraft. I was going to need to focus on detective work and puzzle solving rather than 'random encounters' - or even being chased by mysteriously violent mysterious bad guys - to move the plot along.
I decided for the beginner session to focus more on putting all the disparate characters into a roughly believable setting and situation, one where I wouldn't need to handwave too much shared backstory among them but which would naturally funnel them all into running into each other naturally. So where would this weird bunch of miscreants all looking for a new ship end up? Well, on Beylix, of course, home of the DIY ship for cheap. Once I'd decided on that, it wasn't too much of a stretch to come up with an event that would be sure to draw our ragtag bunch together: a junker's hiring fair complete with ships for sale. Vera's Chop Shop was born.
In the end, I did handwave Molly and Todd knowing each other, and sort of "placed" Cale and Wren where I needed them to be, but all in all I'm still slightly proud of how this first session went. The players got to play their characters and make decisions, but because the 'prize' I'd invented (the chop shop job fair) was big enough, the decision to go there was still essentially theirs. They all came together from different areas, they all had a reason to interact with each other and test out their character-acting chops, and by the time the session ended we had 5 characters in the same place at the same time for roughly the same purpose - without me having to narrate to them what I needed them to do. Not bad for a first try, right?
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