D.T. Pints
Instigator
JACKERCON 2018: WITH GREAT POWER COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY June 22-July 1st
Posts: 2,857
Currently Playing: D&D 5e, Pathfinder, DUNGEONWORLD, Star Wars Edge of the Empire
Currently Running: DUNGEONWORLD, PATHFINDER
|
Post by D.T. Pints on Apr 4, 2017 20:50:16 GMT -8
Session Two reportSo overall much happier with this session, I'd prepared for the group to either investigate the pillar of smoke or to head south after Terrel the mad monk. They took the former and have now had their first combat which included a close call for one of the players (he took over half his total wounds from a single lucky strike but soaked 10 with void) so they've seen how deadly the game can be. Next combat will need to include some higher stats, the peasants they were up against were at only 3k2 to hit and missed all but 2 attacks thanks to the high TNs for most of the group. The trick will be balancing it against the low to hit TNs of the shugenja but I don't think that'll be too much of an issue. Next session (tomorrow) is where things will get interesting (I hope) as it should present a situation where an NPC has massively overreacted to a perceived threat that might not have been real. Also an older and wiser version of our favourite Topaz Champion might make a guest appearance to complicate matters. With haikus 😄
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2017 0:45:01 GMT -8
Yeah I'm really getting into the poetry of the campaign, provides a challenge in setting up the sessions.
Unfortunately I'm unlikely to get any more cameo's in besides Jimunsha as the campaign is going to be relatively short. Aiming for 3 very short arcs, this one should finish tonight then I'm doing a modified version of the sample adventure and finally big heroics deep in the mountains.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on May 1, 2017 13:13:25 GMT -8
Session FourSession FiveSession SixSession SevenSo not updated for a while as I've been really bad at getting adventure logs written. We've completed not only the first arc but the second as well, setting us up for the final part of the campaign. The first arc ended by setting up the bigger picture - they resolved the issue of the monastery being attacked while also learning that a high level shugenja had orchestrated the whole thing in order to destroy the monastery, break down the trust between peasants and monks in the region and possibly start a war between the Crab and the Unicorn. They've prevented the last part but been unable to completely eliminate the building tension. Which brought us to the second arc - the marriage of one character (Shugeki) to the true love of another (Chiaki, who also happens to be a kolat sleeper agent). I based this little arc off of the adventure in the core book and having run it it just reinforced my weaknesses as a GM. I just couldn't find a way to make so many NPCs interesting when the majority had just been introduced during the adventure. Having people mix and mingle just isn't something I can do and I think it would have been even worse if we'd started here as the players wouldn't have had a feel for their characters either. As it was the adventure was saved by the players. They're at the point where they know their characters well enough that they're now playing as real people rather than rigid pillars of bushido. They all lost small amounts of honour just for being bitchy or letting their face slip, helped by the fact that the bride is not in favour of the marriage (political marriage and she took bitter betrothal). This adventure has also seen one of the scorpion players slowly shift towards expectations. He started off as a black sheep goody two shoes who wanted to uphold bushido like the other Clans do. Bit by bit, however, he's sliding towards the easy path of that the Scorpion so often fall into. The best bit though has to have been the sleeper agent. I gave the player 2 secret commands that would be triggered by certain phrases. OOC she had slips of paper with the commands but wasn't allowed to read them until she heard the trigger. The first was just a distraction, to declare her love and disrupt the ceremony which she did, distracting people enough that they didn't pay too much notice to the killer leaving to commit the murder. The second was more sinister, to cause chaos and defend the escape of whoever spoke it. They'd uncovered the likely accomplice of the killer who panicked and activated her as a distraction, not knowing his boss would then use his own magic to add a bit of oomph (casting a fire spell and making it look like she did). All in all it was great fun, especially as she ended up appearing to commit jigai at the end of the session. What the other players don't know though is that the Scorpion governor gave her a choice - join our clan or go to your death. So he faked her death in order to gain a valuable but disposable asset.
|
|
SirGuido
Supporter
Drizztmas Santa
Ask me about the Drizztmas Exchange!
Posts: 2,127
Preferred Game Systems: L5R, Traveller, Fate Accelerated, Masks
Currently Playing: Nothing.
Currently Running: Nothing.
Favorite Species of Monkey: Anything in a Cage.
|
Post by SirGuido on May 2, 2017 9:47:28 GMT -8
I based this little arc off of the adventure in the core book and having run it it just reinforced my weaknesses as a GM. I just couldn't find a way to make so many NPCs interesting when the majority had just been introduced during the adventure. Having people mix and mingle just isn't something I can do and I think it would have been even worse if we'd started here as the players wouldn't have had a feel for their characters either. I've run Winter Court type scenarios before where you have a metric buttload of NPCs to deal with and try to make exciting and interesting. What I did is make myself flash cards. 4x6 index cards with a b&w picture I printed out from online then a few roleplaying hints(like attitude, mannerisms, etc), then a description of their motivations. I'd leave a section blank to add in anything involving the players. In my notes I'd keep track of which npcs would react to thinks the players did and use that to have the NPCs interact with them. Running big npc heavy scenes like that is hard, but this really helped me.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on May 3, 2017 5:56:46 GMT -8
The problem for me, I think, isn't just in making NPCs exciting but also in making the situation flow. The group I'm with at the moment don't naturally slip into idle in character conversation the way you often hear the HJ hosts do so in the APs. That was the big issue, just getting the small talk to occur in a way that wasn't forced and it's something that I need to work on in future, especially when there are a lot of new NPCs to deal with.
|
|