Barf Forth Apocalyptica
barf forth apocalyptica => Apocalypse World => Topic started by: Glendower on August 02, 2010, 03:51:31 AM
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I'm buzzing from excitement after an Apocalypse world I ran this evening.
This game was with a different group than my Hatchet City game, and in this case we had started the game with the first session rules. I was still a little unsteady on my feet, but I was able to get the first session sheet filled out with information.
The first session was run a week earlier. I had Colin, who played JC the Operator. Aaron, who played Navarre the Gunlugger, and Kyle, who played Lemieux the Savvyhead.
I found the first session a bit tricky, but just kept asking questions. Why did Navarre decide to conceal their gender? Where did Lemieux get his knowledge of how to fix things? Where did JC get his postcards from?
The questions allowed me to paint a picture to the world. From JC's past entanglements with a woman, that was sold into slavery, we created Dremmer's Deliveries, a Slaver who's gangs of "collectors" snatched stragglers from the different hard holds.
Dremmer was a second in command to President Hugo, who killed Navarre's uncle and scarred Navarre's face. Navarre's full face helmet being the result, which also hid the gender of Navarre from others.
We found out that Lemieux scavenged his van from a museum of old Television props. His van was the original A-Team van, from the series.
It was in this van that we started the game, driving East along the Gamma Highway. We talked about where this Highway was, and we decided that it was one of the East-West directional Interstates, somewhere in California.
They arrived at a fallen bridge, and began to try and cross. I didn't have any fronts, so I just kept to the moves on the MC list. After a failed "read a situation move" I had a small group at the other side of the bridge take potshots at them with a hunting rifle.
Navarre got shot but a thick armor absorbed the shot quite easily, the low harm roll doing the rest. Navarre then fired a sniper rifle back, (Take something by force) turning the shooter into chutney. Three others stood up and ran at Navarre, closing the distance before he could bring his gun to bear. (activating the stuff's downside)
JC tried to stop hostilities, manipulating the situation, and calling for a ceasefire and talk. He managed to (Manipulating) and convinced them to let his crew pass in exchange for a piece of barter (make them buy).
From there, they headed up and over to the settlement.
So I put up Rover Ville, a small convoy of old RVs, descendents of an RV park who banded together for safety. The original 40 RVs shrank over the decades to a lonely 5 heavily patched and modified vehicles. They travelled from place to place, never staying longer than needed.
They entered and met with Amy, the techic, Monk, the security for King Millions, and King Millions, the massively obsese leader of Roverville. JC made some deals with Millions (Manipulate) to protect the caravan against raiders (announce future badness).
He made a second deal to help Amy out with her tech, and Amy invited JC out for dinner. (Separate Them)
Meanwhile, Lemieux and Navarre found an ancient service station, the parking lot of which being where Rover Ville had set up camp. The ground floor was a skeletal ruin, but the subbasement was never opened. The two of them eagerly opened up the subbasement and ventured into the waist deep water in the lower level. (Offer an opportunity)
A massive crayfish rose out of the water and attacked Navarre, and I kept cutting between Navarre and Lemieux's grim struggle for survival with Amy and JC's christmas light lit dinner. It was great! Navarre proved to be an incredible killing force, taking t
By the end, we established thtrough Amy's dinner that while Millions was beloved by the people, Monk did much of the work. Monk resented Millions, but wasn't leadership manterial, nor did he want the job.
JC ended up having sex with Amy, gaining an obligation gig with her. Afterwards he shows her his postcards, insisting these are real places that are beautiful place to settle down, pointing especially to a place called "The Florida Keys".
After besting the crayfish, Navarre and Lemiux found a few barter worth of spare parts. They wanted to sneak it onto the van without the city noticing (acting under fire) and ended up blowing the roll (Put someone in a Spot) as the van drives over and rips out several cable plugins, plunging the whole camp into darkness.
Lemieux attempts to fix the broken connection quickly (acting under fire) and blows the roll, electrocuting himself (Inflict Harm). The harm roll was a 10, so I picked that he was knocked right out. Navarre quickly puts Lemiuex into the van and attempts to heal the damage, and bring him to wakefulness.
A +stock roll later (Navarre has prepared for the Inevitable), Lemieux was on the mend and awake.
Navarre attempted to calm the camp, JC assisting. (Manipulate). They get the camp calmed down, blaming the jumpy generator, but promise to keep a close watch on the area. (Promise in exchange)
We ended there. I was pleased with the game, and had some things written down to turn into fronts. Dremmer, Hugo, Gamma Road, Rover Ville all seemed like possible threats to hammer down into fronts.
I'll post what I did with Fronts, and how I figured them out, in a couple of hours. Then, I'll post tonight's second session, where all that front prep did super awesome stuff ot the game. But now, I sleep!
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Sounds like a lot of fun, and like you were really on your toes with the MC moves!
I think it's funny that you had a mini-dungeon crawl in your AW first session, though (underground chamber, fight monster, get treasure ;D)
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So did you essentially rely on asking questions and MC moves for the whole first session? It sounds like it worked like a charm!
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Kind of hilarious when I think about the dungeon crawl. I had no idea that the service station was there, until Lemieux started looking around with his Metal detector, looking for "something valuable". Navarre really needed some jingle to help fix up his armor, which got damaged in the fight with the sniper (Make them buy), and was helping out. The offer an opportunity move just made sense, and I really wanted to bring in a huge mutant crayfish, but forgot about it when they went over the bridge.
First session was totally all about constantly asking questions and fielding logical moves. There was a little bit of rules confusion, I had really not grokked when Harm rolls occurred, and was rolling it for NPCs, which I later corrected when I realized that NPCs don't get harm rolls. The players preferred that I roll harm on them by the way, it made things easier to remember that high Harm rolls were bad news. It also allowed me to roll dice, which makes me happy.
My hand cramped painfully from frantically writing stuff though. I hate that, my hands are slightly arthritic, and get really bad from sustained writing. I gotta start recording sessions again.
Hey, if I start recording sessions and put them up as a podcast, would anyone want to listen to them? I usually record so I can get a record of what happened in the game, and can make notes at a slower pace over the course of the next few weeks, but if there's interest, I can put them up.
Just about done writing up my Fronts I used for last night's game. Fronts took a bit to figure out, but once I got it, they were awesome. More to come!
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I would listen! I love actual play podcasts.
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Kind of hilarious when I think about the dungeon crawl. I had no idea that the service station was there, until Lemieux started looking around with his Metal detector, looking for "something valuable". Navarre really needed some jingle to help fix up his armor, which got damaged in the fight with the sniper (Make them buy), and was helping out. The offer an opportunity move just made sense, and I really wanted to bring in a huge mutant crayfish, but forgot about it when they went over the bridge.
Hahah, that's cool, I was mostly being silly. It sounds like you handled the MCing like a champ, keeping things rolling, finding out about the world, and setting stuff up for later. Speaking of which. . .
Just about done writing up my Fronts I used for last night's game. Fronts took a bit to figure out, but once I got it, they were awesome. More to come!
Post these bad boys up! I've found looking at other people's fronts really helpful for getting a feel on what fronts are and how they do and what not.
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Ask and ye shall get! Here's the three Fronts I was working from. I didn't use all three at once, I went from Within Roverville quite a bit and then selected from Gamma Road and the Republic of Hugo here and there, when I wanted to change things up.
Here's the Fronts I cooked up for last night's game. We hit almost everything, which I'll put together in my monster ap from last night (it went from 6pm to almost 1 in the morning, we literally couldn't stop playing! I haven't done that in a while)
From the initial game, I made up three fronts:
Front One: Within RoverVille
Expresses: Fear – The people of RoverVille are terrified. Raiders and mutants and cannibals threaten them, and their rootless existence casts a constant fear of the unknown, just down the road.
Dark Future: RoverVille will fall to the next Slaver attack, and it’s people will be sold off as labor, entertainment, and food.
Threats:
King Millions (Warlord – Prophet)
King Millions has a tenuous hold on RoverVille, and bristles against any threat to his rule of this place. His huge size prevents him from walking, and he spends much of his life in the RV, attended to by his loyal servants.
However, the people love and cherish him, and his low, regal voice gives them strength and confidence. When Millions is threatened, he tends to make snap decisions, endangering RoverVille’s existence.
His loyal servants attend to his every will, viewing him as a sign of plenty. So long as King Millions stays fat, it is a sign that RoverVille is still doing all right.
The Sputtering Lights (Affliction – Barrier)
Roverville’s constant movement has been a huge strain on resources, and shit keeps breaking down. If one of the last 5 RVs breaks down, they’re stranded until they can get it wheezing to life again.
Custom Move: When something in RoverVille breaks, there just might be enough spare parts to kludge something together. +Wierd – 10+ found just the thing, we can keep moving, 7-9 RoverVille’s grounded for a day or two to cobble something together, Miss – It’s fucked, we keep going, but RoverVille now moves even slower than before.
Monk’s Crew (Brute – Enforcer)
Monk is the second in command to RoverVille. A descendant of a group of Park Rangers, he and his crew of about 10 (small gang Armor 0 Harm 2) do their best to protect RoverVille from harm. As a contrast to King Millions he’s actually competent, but has the personality of a wet sock.
He’s increasingly worried about the leadership of King Millions, and is actively looking for someone with a similar kingly presence to replace him. Until he does, Monk does everything in his power to ensure that Millions stays King.
Stakes:
Will Monk find a successor? Will that last RV, with the leaking engine, keep limping along? Will the people lose hope in their sovereign?
?
Front Two: Gamma Road
Expresses: Ignorance. The road they’re travelling takes them East across the shattered United States. It’s an unknown thing, fuelled by rumour and speculation, as well as ancient torn roadmaps. Who knows what lurks on the Gamma Road?
Stakes: Will the road lead to salvation or damination? What communities exist along the road?
Dark Future: The Road shatters and kills all upon it, leaving Bleached bones on either shoulder, the yellow lines a broken path to Hell.
Threats:
Crine Marsh (Landscape: Breeding Pit)
Vivid green algae over burbling water, humid and gassy air rots fabric and rusts metal. The Marsh eats through the Gamma road and turns it into little islands amongst the thick green growths.
The Dustbin (Landscape – Maze)
Several Million tonnes of Lead infused dust was dumped upon a radioactive crater, in an effort to put out the eternal fire that burned. It partially succeeded, but the dust remained, getting into everything, killing all plants and animals within several miles. It’s kicked up with a footstep, a light wind creates a cloud, and a vehicle creates a storm of deadly Lead infused dust. The lead confuses compasses, the dust covers the road, and creates a sense of vertigo, as all around you is swirling, glittering dust.
Custom Move: When trying to travel through the Dustbin +sharp for each day. 10 – Progress is made through the Dustbin(+2 to the countdown), 7-9 – We’re off course, and have to spend a little extra time in this horrible place (+1 to the countdown), Miss - We’re lost, and we’ll have to spend the night here (no countdown bonus).
Movement Countdown: 3pm – within the dust trail, 6pm – the bones of a dust covered city, 9pm the crater, still hot from the flickering fires below, 10pm – mummified bodies in a convoy of vehicles, 11pm – a train wreck a mile long, 12pm Free and clear from that glittering hell.
Dust Cough (Affliction – Disease)
The lead infused dust in the dustbin is really bad for you. Like, super awful fucking bad.
For each day in the dustbin +Hard. 10+ no sweat, what’s a little dust? 7-9 Fucking *cough* dust (+1 on affliction countdown), Miss – “Can’t *gasp* breathe in this shit! (+2 on affliction countdown)
+1 if they can put together something to prevent the dust from getting into eyes, mouth, or pores, or their outfit suggests similar (acting under fire to find something in the Dustbin)
Countdown: 3pm – Hacking Cough, 6pm – Blood in spit, 9pm – Blurry vision, 10pm – Pissing blood, 11pm – tremors in the muscles, 12pm – choke to death.
To treat Dust Cough: +stock. 10: cleared up, erase affliction countdown, 7-9 partial treatment, remove one segment, Miss: the only way to cure it is to get the fuck out of the dustbin.
Parcher’s Raiders (Grotesque Cannibals)
Parcher, Mice, Fauna and about 30 others live in the bones of the city, within the sewers.
When the countdown for the Dustbin hits 6pm, they open the manholes and creep out, encircling the group in preparation to strike.
They wear thick layers of rubber, plastic bags, and other equipment to survive the Dustbin, but their eyes shine with the same glittering glow as the dust. Their protective gear works for the dust, but isn’t effective against things like blades and bullets.
(Medium Group, Armor 0, Harm 1 (butcher knives and other meat preparation tools). They are hungry for fresh meat, and Parcher leads them, armed with a wicked polearm made from a stop sign (3 harm close).
Front Three: The Republic of Hugo
Expresses: Ambition – President Hugo hungers for more territory, more control. His republic grows every day, and he wants all to serve him. His army and his affiliations with Dremmer’s Deliveriesgive him the muscle and labor needed to realize his dreams of conquest
Dark Future: The wasteland in the grip of a cruel Dictator, who sows human misery, waters with blood and tears, and reaps a foul harvest of broken souls.
Threats:
Dremmer’s Collectors (Warlord, Slaver)
Dremmer’s Collectors work for a company called Dremmer’s Deliveries. They snatch stragglers from isolated communities, break their spirit, and sell them as slaves.
Custom Move: Stragglers disappear – If a larger group is travelling with the PCs, roll +sharp. 10+ some idiots wander away, but you call them back. 7-9 – One person is missing, but there’s tracks you can follow. Miss – at the end of the day, the group realizes that someone’s long gone.
Small Disciplined Group, Armor 1, Harm 2 (guns and clubs, nets and drugs)
The Republic of Hugo Soldiers (Brute, Sybarites)
Rum and Corbett run the roving patrols that tax travellers for using the Republic’s Roads. They’re fucking jackals.
While in Hugo’s territory, +sharp: 10+ you see and can avoid them. 7-9 – a small patrol stops you, miss – the larger patrol stops you.
Small patrol – led by Rum (Small, armor 1, Harm 2 (handguns and old hunting rifles)) – 1 barter tax for the group
Medium Patrol – Led by Corbett (Medium, Armor 1, Harm 2 (handguns and old hunting rifles) – 2 barter tax for the group.
Six Blades (Landscape, Fortress)
This holding is the main outpost for Hugo’s forces in this area. Led by one of his lieutenants, a fucker named Grome. Hugo’s forces are resupplied here (Corbett and Rum return to this location often) and a garrison of 10 guys keep a lookout. (small Armor 1 (+1 if in the holding due to barricades), Harm 2 – (guns and blades))
The town itself is situated around 6 working windmills, their three blades turning in the breeze, constantly charging half a hundred car batteries, stacked in a pile. The town makes it’s jingle from recharging batteries, selling and buying batteries, and are surrounded by a wall of gutted cars, trucks, vans, buses. Everyone lives in a vehicle of some kind, tires long taken, but the shell remaining.
the council that runs the place consists of Grome, Tum Tum (who looks after the blades) Ula, and Fuse. Grome is leader, the rest reluctantly follow his rule. The Red Flag of the Republic of Hugo flies on one of the windmills.
One of Dremmer’s Delivery stands are here, selling slaves. Anyone taken by the Collectors (see threat) can be found here, and sold for a price.
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This is a elegantly clear and useful thread wrt how you used the moves and put the fronts together. I like how the moves and fiction naturally flow from one to the other. And sure, put up AP podcasts!
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I love the image of the post-coital postcard scene with the Florida Keys card and JC insisting they were real places. I can totally see it. I adore all the scenes about hope in AW whether they are clearly false or half-dreams.
Thanks for posting your Fronts. I'm going to post all of mine after our campaign is a little further along (with "stay away" notices for the players). I have quite a few countdowns but seeing your Fronts has inspired me to do a few more custom moves to color my people and places. It occurs to me that the main reason I don't have more custom moves is for lack of space on the default forms. I'm going to transfer all of my fronts to notebook paper tonight.
While I love AP posts I don't care for most AP podcasts. But I would totally listen to and appreciate an Apocalypse World one.
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The new 3-fold front forms are great (http://www.lumpley.com/apocalypse/ApocalypseWorld-playbooks.pdf) (they're after the character 3 folds), and have lots of space. But mostly I put stuff together on a word document, as again, writing can really hurt for me. Typing doesn't quite do the same thing to my fingers, so it's easier on me. I wish I could type at the game, but a laptop at the gaming table just distracts me too much, and we don't have a lot of space to set one up.
Still typing up last night's session! Lots happened, the game really trucks along when you're playing it, and with 6 hours of game time, it's a lot to process.
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Oooh, I'm looking forward to reading about it!
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Wow, those are really well put together, evocative fronts. Good stuff!
I found this quote especially cool for some reason:
His loyal servants attend to his every will, viewing him as a sign of plenty. So long as King Millions stays fat, it is a sign that RoverVille is still doing all right.
It struck me as just the right sort of plausible illogicality of people struggling to deal with a screwed up situation. It would have been so easy to make him fat because he oppresses everybody, but having his people love him and *want* to keep him fat is just brilliant.
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The best part of this Jeff, is that it actually happened in history. During World War 2, it was part of something known as "Propaganda of Reassurance". There would be public displays of the Royalty eating well, even when the entire country was on strict rations. It bolstered the myth that the sitation was not as desparate as it appeared.
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Hah! I knew that had some hardcore verisimilitude going :)
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After I put together those fronts, I got news that Aaron couldn’t make it, and Daniel could. So I took a look at the rules for introducing a new character. It worked really well, and got Daniel into the action quickly.
So to recap, we had JC the Operator, and Lemieux the Savvyhead. They had hitched onto RoverVille, a mobile holding made up of a convoy of 5 built and rebuilt RVs, led by the beloved and Corpulent King Millions. JC was in a relationship with Amy, Roverville’s resident technician.
When Sunday’s game started, we discussed absent characters at the table. It made sense to us that given the rather transient state of the character we had right now, players not there would be “off in the wastes, following up their own goals”. In fact, it also set an interesting precedent, one that will probably help this game be a little more resilient to when a few people inevitably can’t make it.
We had just had a Burning Wheel game put on hold due to two players being unable to make it. I’m thinking that with Apocalypse World, I’m pretty sure that we can keep the game going even if just one person shows up to game. After all, the threats will loom whether they’re all together or not.
I’m thinking of designing a custom move for each character when they miss a session, to represent what they’ve been doing. I saw that in the game text, and thought that might be kind of neat.
At any rate, I ran Daniel down the basic idea of Apocalypse world, and gave him the remaining characters. I have to say that the Trifold playsheets are much easier to read, those little booklets are great, but the size of the Trifolds really helped Daniel quickly put stuff together. Him not having the moves handy was tricky, though.
After some consideration, Daniel picked the Chopper. From that was born Goldie, a transvestite that takes no shit, leader of Goldie’s Girls, a savage group of monsters. Stinky, Lars, Diamond, Hooch, Juck, Blues, and about 10 others rode with her. Daniel choose for the gang to be better armed and mobile, which really fit the nomadic feel for the game. Unfortunately, they weren’t healthy, so I had some disease possibilities to play with.
I was wondering what having a crew would be like, and it turned out to be an absolute joy. These characters were so much fun for me to play, I proceeded to channel everything from Easy Rider to Sons of Anarchy to make these fuckers come to life.
History for the new character went really smooth, using the rules from the book. When we got started, I presented the Gamma road, Goldie’s Girls riding on it. I mentioned that a big group of Hugo’s soldiers had been dogging them for days, and they had ridden nonstop to get some distance (Announcing off screen badness).
They were low on pretty much everything, and the girls (be aware that every single member of the crew thus far are male, but Goldie refers to them as her girls, it was just a thing) were starting to look worn and tired. (Announcing future badness).
When they reach the fallen bridge at the Crine Marsh, they look uneasily at the two paths, one across the fallen bridge, slowly sinking in the marsh, and one path across the marsh itself. (This is my first Threat move using the Landscape of Crine Marsh – Provide another way)
I used the crew liberally here. Diamond became a sorta second in command, I gave him a torn wedding dress worn around his leather jacket, complete with veil that he wore over his helmet. I got Diamond to ask the question “Shit Goldie, that bridge don’t look so good, but fuck me is that marsh nasty. What do we do?” I bridged a lot of my “what do you do” questions to Goldie asked through the gang, and it’s a great trick to keep the world feeling authentic.
And then Daniel spoke. He had figured out a voice for Goldie, authoritative, husky, sexy and profane. It was just... awesome. When Goldie spoke, we knew it, and Daniel just knocked the character out of the park.
“I’m not risking our fucking bikes in that shit. Stinky! You’re gonna drive across.”
Stinky was a proud moment for me. His voice was breathy and labored, I kind of relaxed my mouth and spoke through it. I kept in mind that Apocalypse world inhabitants just aren’t that complicated, and had him crave Goldie’s attention, kind of like a child looking for approval of a parent. Stinky, Daniel explained, is on the heaviest bike, it even has a sidecar that contains a bunch of the gang’s additional gear.
I had Stinky drive up to Goldie, look down the slope at the fallen bridge, and then lean over to Goldie with a worried look on his slackjawed face and whisper “You’ll keep an eye on me, won’t cha Goldie? I’ll be awful lonely down there”. (Telling her possible consequences and then asking)
I wanted to see how she treats her bikers. There’s this hard edge to her so far, how far does it go? And Goldie... pats him tenderly on the cheek with her white, sequinned glove. “We’ll be right here Stinky, don’t you worry.”
And then Daniel looks at me and says “All right you fuckers, we need a rope! Who’s got one?” The Chopper’s first move! A great roll later, Juck pulls out a 50 foot extension cord from one of his saddlebags, that can be used, in a pinch, as a decent rope.
They secure Stinky and he drives down and begins to make his way across. The bridge seems to be holding...
Now, at this point I swing over to the other characters. They have heard the thunder of the Gang’s engines, and a worried Monk (the enforcer of Roverville) asks them to investigate. “I wonder what Shen’s doing over there” mutters JC, as they head to the van and drive out.
What indeed. Shen was one of the four men (down to three) that were blockading the Marsh and extracting a toll. (Landscape move: Bar the Way) As Stinky made his way across the bridge, he begins to get shot , bullets spanging around him (Technically capturing someone) and a sniper on the other side sits up from the marsh foliage (Landscape move – Reveal something). Screaming curses, Goldie guns her bike down the side of the embankment, screaming to her gang to “Kill that motherfucker!”.
Violence is in the air, and after sussing out what Daniel wanted (save Stinky from getting hit) I went with Seizing by force. And he fails the roll! I activate Goldie’s bike’s downside, having it buck and force her to spin out to stay on. The advance is broken, and the sniper leisurely takes a shot, Stinky takes one right in the chest, slumping on his seat. I want to make Stinky's injury an issue later, so instead of killing him I had him badly hurt. I of course had Stinky announce this with “Ah, Ahm Hurt pretty bahd.”
Meanwhile, JC and Lemieux pull up. Recognizing Goldie from dealings in the past (We established in History that Goldie had gotten some work done on her vehicles by Lemieux, and JC had given her a job but then acted like he was in charge in front of her gang) Lemieux turns his gun on the sniper, and JC tries to get in the way to stop this, claiming that the Gang at the bridge were being hired by Hugo.
Taking by force proceeds, and JC’s 8 on the roll means he shares in the danger. Lemieux pulls the trigger of his shotgun, and the sniper takes the hit. (he rolled a 12 on the die, pretty insane)
The sniper dies, and since JC only got a partial hit he shares in the danger. Lucky for him the harm roll for JC is a miss. I have him lose his footing from the Harm move, dodging the shot but then falling down the hill with the sniper’s corpse. The tumble bruised up his back, taking 1 harm (3 harm for the weapon, minus armor and a miss on the harm move – I figured this would be a great way to explain the smaller amount of harm inflicted). This actually adds to history between JC and Lemieux, the first time that a character has given harm to another.
I turn to Goldie and tell her that the gang’s disorganized and confused from the attacks (Landscape move, taking away their sense of purpose) She rallies them (using her alpha Chopper move) and one awesome roll later, leads them up the side of the opposite bank, getting her girls to surround Lemieux, Shen, and the other guy, who I named Fleece. (Name everyone!)
JC stumbles up the bank, and quickly tried to manipulate She, claiming that the group was hired by him to help with his plans, in the name of President Hugo (It was established last session that JC is posing as one of Hugo’s officers). Lemieux responds with an angry “fuck that guy!” and Goldie agrees. They both roll to impede his manipulation, and both utterly fail. Colin explains that JC makes a quick wink to both of them to silence their protest. However, it’s only a partial hit, and Shen demands payment for killing one of his men, in the form of one of Goldie’s guns.
Goldie takes the gun out and says “Take it in the mouth, you fucking asshole!” and fires. One 10+ roll later, and Shen’s faceless corpse lies on the dirt. The men proceed to jump down and dismember the corpse, mounting the torso onto a broken "bridge X-ing" sign, making Shen into a grim sign with the words, written in his blood “don’t fuck with Goldie’s girls”. This becomes an ongoing theme in the next few conflicts. It is the first step in building up the rituals that Goldie's Girls tend to undertake.
Fleece begs Goldie for mercy (put someone in a spot), and she extends one of her long legs off the bike, putting it daintily on Fleece’s hand, not saying a word. She then proceeds to ignore him and addresses JC.
They argue, briefly, about killing Shen. JC tells her that Shen was one of Hugo’s soldiers, and their death will mean retaliation. He explained that he was trying to get safe passage for her and the gang across the checkpoint (Lemieux has a great moment of “Oooh, that was what you were doing, I shouldn’t have shot him then!”)
Fleece is still whimpering for mercy under Goldie’s boot. She applies a little pressure, and gives a gentle little “shhh”. They begin to talk about Roverville, and the possible work for her and her girls. As they’re talking, Colin has JC do a Read on Goldie. A huge success later, he asks how she’s really feeling. Daniel thinks about it and says “Relief, huge Relief”.
In spite of her hard exterior, Goldie was worried about her gang, suffering this long without respite. Again, it really added something to the character.
I then have Stinky crest over the top of the bank, covered in blood “I feel bad, Goldie.” I describe the wound being a nasty one, the bullet still lodged inside of him, causing him pain. His face was pale and sweaty, he looked close to losing consciousness (tell them the consequences).
JC was quick to action, He had advanced life support to his van, and was eager to try it out. By the way, the workshop descriptions work awesome for people, especially when I picked that it’ll take about a day, and several attempts. I describe the bullet and the patient moving, much more than a broken toaster or a damaged piece of tech ever would. Stinky’s bellows of agony in the Van are in the background, as JC and Goldie still have their tense little conversation.
Goldie agrees to go with JC to Roverville, but demands food and drink for her girls. JC is confident that they’ll provide it.
She then looks down at Fleece, a 16 year old scrawny boy, stained green from the muck of the marsh, and around at her crew. The bikers, having looted the two bodies, were busy making a necklace out of the sniper’s teeth, and then having a small scuffle to see who gets it. Fleece follows her gaze (this is her going aggro move, and it's a direct hit) and Fleece surrenders with a panicked, hopeless look. She picks up Fleece, and then gently puts him in front of her, on the bike. In contrast to the gentleness, she says something like “I’ll enjoy this little bitch later” to the cheers of the rest of her crew.
From there they head into Roverville.
More later!
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Glen, another great AP post!
I have a question for you, though: were you one of those people that read the MCing advice and was like "oh yeah, that's how I always do it", or is this style new(ish) to you? I ask because your description of using the moves and fronts and the results that come from them is just crystal clear and really organic, and it sounds like a blast. I still haven't had a chance to run, and I'm a bit nervous I'll pick it up quickly and easily, so I'm curious from what background you're coming at these moves. Thanks!
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Well, I have run a lot of stuff in the past. I think that this particular style is somewhat similar to what I used to do, kinda, in some of my old Shadowrun games, especially when I finally mostly ignored the rules in those books (The whole system gave me fucking hives, but I loved the setting) and played fast and loose, which means little to no "here's what happens at this point of the story" kind of preparation.
I'd stumble along, and go with logical consequences for the actions of the players. Sometimes it would work really well, and there were some memorable moments where I wasn't quite sure what was going to happen next, but it was fun to find out with a random 50/50 roll here, and a "you need (random) successes" there.
Even there I'd sometimes get stuck thinking of what to do, and sort of throw out something that would end up being lame. There was very little GM support for this sort of gaming, and we weren't using the rules system much at all, as it didn't give us anything in terms of satisfaction or interesting consequences.
But what the rules and procedures in Apocalypse World allow me to do is jog my mind. If I follow the instructions, I can play in this loose fashion, but never be scrambling around trying to figure out what to do next. I have a set of moves, I have a set of threats. These moves and threats have very provocative effects, and can really push the characters to act.
The player moves allow me to push for a hard response move with a miss, not necessarily doing harm, but giving me permission to have things occur.
For example, when the crayfish loomed, Navarre tried to blow it away, but failed the roll. This allowed me to have the creature grab and toss his shotgun into the murky water (Take away their stuff). A hard move that didn't get any protests, because it's established as rules that failing a roll means I can follow up with a move in response. God help me if I tried something like that in Shadowrun, there simply isn't any kind of rules in Shadowrun that gives me the agency to do this.
As a side note, the list of names was something I did in other games. I'd cross off names from a list and place them into the game, as needs dictated. It was a useful tool, and it's neat that Vincent included it.
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Very cool, I appreciate your feedback. I can't wait to run a game of AW or at least using the "MC techniques" of AW. Unfortunately, I've done a lot more thinking of running games than actually running over the years, and I'd like to correct that. In the game I'm playing in right now (the 'Apocalypse Wave' game advertised hereabouts a while back) I'm trying to pay attention to how the MC is using the moves and such like (despite his misdirection and not naming :) ) so that I can run a kickass game of my own in the near future. Thanks for helping me do the same with your game that I'm not playing in!
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Some interesting things happened shortly after JC and Lemieux took Goldie to Roverville.
Goldie was asked to a private dinner with King Millions. (I had fun with this: a can of Cat food, full of protein and quite delicious when you mix it with a can of onion soup. I compared it to spongy meatloaf) During that Dinner, I had Millions propose to her that she replace Monk as his personal guard, confessing that he was quite taken with her. He even suggested that she could be his Queen He was worried about Monk's loyalty, (Future Badness), and wanted someone that he could trust with his life, and his heart. (Offer Opportunity).
Goldie compromises, not wanting to settle down with Millions replying with a hair toss and "Sorry, Honey. I'm not that kind of woman!" but agreeing to protect the convoy for a week in exchange for fuel and food.
The next leg of the journey takes them through a part called the dustbin. I started having a lot of fun with countdowns here. Getting through the dustbin required a +sharp check to maneuver through a whirlwind of lead infused dust, that glittered in the night with it's own radioactive light. The faster they made it through the dustbin the less the people were inflicted with Dust cough, an affliction that had it's own countdown.
In addition, as they travelled through the dustbin, at each point in the countdown they'd encounter different things, for example the bones of a city, coated in this dust. This is where an attempted ambush occurred.
Again, I presented the situation, following my moves, and asked what happened. I used one of the bike gang to ask this question, as I find it keeps people in "the moment". Goldie worked quite quickly getting masks on all of her gang, (acting under fire, getting an 11 on the roll). which reduced the speed of her countdown with the dust cough. I also had the whirlwind of dust separate the gang from the convoy(more moves) and make some of Lemieux's various gadgets not work properly in the storm (activate stuff's downside, his high tech stuff).
The ambush, which was the first really big fight, was a group of cannibals who lived in the sewers of the old town. Parcher was the leader, and his lieutenants Harrow and Still led a group of 40 crazed, starved monsters to the convoy.
Combat was pretty awesome, medium gangs are terrifying. I had them come out of the storm, covered armor made from plastic bags, wearing old snorkeling gear and cut out water jugs to protect them from the lead dust. For the first little bit, it was JC verses this huge force, and he did what he could to inspire Monk's gang to fight back. I had several of Roverville get taken away, the cannibals already carving into them to take the choice cuts back to their sewer.
Then Goldie and Lemieux returned. Lemieux ran over a bunch of them (I quickly looked up the vehicle rules, and man, very easy stuff), and Goldie's group faced off against the larger gang. I name the Roverville people taken, using Amy, as well as a little girl name Penelope, her mom Clarion and husband Foster. A Take by Force roll later Goldie managed to take back the terrified people from the larger gang, and inflicted massive casualties. I had the other gang fight back, and a harm roll later indicated that Goldie and her gang took some injuries, and a casualty.
For Goldie's injuries, Daniel had her grab Penelope and protect the girl with her own body, as several cannibals beat on Goldie with tenderizing chains and stab at her with long knives.
Her gang's casualty was a chance for me to look through crosshairs. I target one of Goldie's gang, one of the named ones, an older biker named Hooch. I have Parcher take out Hooch with a spear carved from the pole of a street sign, impaling the old biker and then taking a bite out of his neck. Parcher is this seven foot tall monster, all corded muscle, and Hooch shudders and dies.
Goldie goes ballistic, and goes one on one with Parcher. Parcher's troops are in full retreat at this point, so I have him point at Goldie and shout "you and me, right now". They run at each other, and A take by force roll (knocked out of the park) later, Parcher is cut to pieces, mounted on his own spear like a grotesque sign, with "don't fuck with Goldie's girls written in his own blood".
Goldie only takes a small cut from the attack (the harm roll was a miss, and her armor ate up the rest), and the gang gathers up Hooch.
Meanwhile, JC is in combat with Harrow, one of the cannibals. He had Amy in his grasp, and he is able to wrestle Harrow to the ground, and disable him (take by force). JC takes the cannibal prisoner. This is pretty awesome, and causes all kinds of trouble later.
I ask what Goldie's Girls do when one of their own dies. This creates a very poignant scene where the solemn bikers each take a small item off of Hooch, a tangible piece to remember him by. They keep his weapon and leathers on him, arrange him on the ground, and pay their respect.
Goldie looks at Fleece and says "someday, you'll earn his Ride" and pins one of Hooch's belongings onto Fleece's shirt. Hooch's bike is strapped to the RVs, and the gang proceeds to loot and strip the bodies of the cannibals, giving the plastic armor and facemasks to the convoy to protect them against the dust cough (a great idea that lowers their countdown). The gang proceeds to take trophies in the form of teeth and ears from the fallen foes "for Hooch!".
A series of great rolls later gets them out of the Dustbin, and into sight of Six Blades, one of the holdings controlled by Hugo (flying his red and black flag). Lemieux, working to reverse the effects of the Dust Cough, needs to trade for items in Six Blades to get something together, (the Workshop needs are great stuff), so Lemieux, JC, JC's pet cannibal Harrow, Goldie and a trio of her Lieutenants (Lars, Diamond, and Blues) head into Six Blades.
Six Blades is named after the six working windmills the city is built around, which allows the city to produce power. It's stored in a half a hundred car batteries, and can be used to charge any electronic device found in the wastes. The theme of the town is rusted out vehicles, used as storefronts and dwellings. A wall of twisted automobiles rings the city, and a makeshift flamethrower sits on the holding's front wall.
Their meeting with the Six Blades council is interesting, as JC makes use of his reputation move. Now, the council consisted of the technician Tum Tum, the Hugo representative Grome, and the married couple Fuse and Ula. JC's reputation as a Former professional Slaver (this was a result of a successful roll! Colin wanted to go there, so I didn't object) made Grome happy, and he showed him around to where some of Dremmer's Collectors were selling off a group of slaves.
While shopping in the market, Lemieux decided he wanted his own slave, and bought one from Dremmer's Collectors. Enter Osiris, one of the most beaten down characters I've ever played. The Collectors knew JC, and greeted him warmly, but mentioned that he had been "out of the game" for a few years.
Meanwhile, Goldie checked out the city's defenses. (Acting under Fire led to a huge success) She determined that there was only a small garrison of Hugo's men here, but they were fairly well protected in the holding.
The group gets together afterward to discuss their options. Goldie is adamant to kill Grome, and JC uses manipulation to convince Goldie to do it his way. (that Xp carrot is awesome and irresistible!)
JC meets with Grome privately and discusses the state of Hugo's Union (finding out that Grome has thrown his lot with Dremmer, who is planning a coup against Hugo, and is looking for agents to work for him). Meanwhile, Lemieux cooks up some delicious food to distract Hugo's troops, and Goldie neutralizes the front guards quietly and gets the door open for her Gang.
Some awesome rolls have it go off without a hitch. As the men are enjoying their food, they're caught unawares by Goldie's gang. Lemieux threatens them (going aggro), they surrender, and then Kyle, with a flourish, advances Lemieux to have a gang. The leader, Hobbs, throws in his lot with Lemieux, who accepts his offer of protection. In fiction advancement!
Meanwhile, JC shoots Grome in the face, killing him. Goldie heads over and replaces Hugo's flag with Grome's corpse flapping in the breeze.
She then tells Fuse and Ula to give her gang food and booze or "we'll burn this fucking place to the ground." Another Aggro move is successful!
A party commences, and we ended it for the night, as it was very, very late.
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Oh, there was one little moment I forgot. It was again, a logical followup of the way the narrative went, but again a move I can do.
When Goldie went to her gang to attack Six Blades, Blues rebelled. He was angry that they were letting Harrow, one of the cannibals, walk around breathing, especially after what happened with Hooch. (putting Goldie into a spot). She had a make a pack Alpha check to keep Blues from disrespecting her, and it was a really tense moment in the game. She managed to get Blues to back down after cuffing him in the face and planting a few choice kicks on him when he went down, but I established the gang's hostility to Harrow and JC for letting Harrow live. It was a great moment, again using the people the characters care about to make the neat conflicts occur.
In addition, JC picked up the Followers advance at the end of the game, represented by members of Roverville, Six Blades, and even a few members of Goldie's gang (!) and Lemieux's security detail (!!). This had really neat effects in the next session, as now there's these groups who all believe in JC's postcards, the dream of a better place called "The Florida Keys".
The Venn type diagrams of someone who is both Goldie's Girl and believes in JC's dream is really good stuff.
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The Venn type diagrams of someone who is both Goldie's Girl and believes in JC's dream is really good stuff.
Okay, so I know this is basically "make PC-NPC-PC triangles" but the venn diagram image just made me realize the "NPC" vertex of the triangle can a) be groups, and b) have interesting mechanical ramifications (e.g. be part of a gang and part of followers). So awesome.
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Last session was great, and it was recorded! The audio recording was much better quality than I thought it would be, it was crazy hot and we had two fans blowing, but the mic was put up high and it didn't get the usual "fan roar" effect. I guess this is why they make boom mikes the way they do. Plus I did a lot of tweaks on audacity, including cutting out a couple of aside conversations and some pauses.
At any rate, the game went a very quick 4 hours, and it was a joy all the way through. I'm again following my moves, looking through crosshairs, saying what the fiction demands.
The one thing I'm guilty about here is not asking for a few more rolls, and asking a bunch more questions. I also need to work on my juggling of screentime for all the players involved. Listening to the game a second time gave me some insights on how we play, and it was neat to hear how the fiction gets constructed.
Here is the Link. (http://www.archive.org/download/YouCanHackitAP1/ApocWorldRecording.mp3)
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I only listened to the first quarter or so before I had to stop for the sake of small ears entering the room, but it sounds like you were all having a blast.
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Another great session just ended. Daniel couldn't make it, so Goldie and her Girls had gone out into the wastes, likely seeing if Fleece was made of the right stuff for the gang. I was thinking of having a custom move set up for Daniel to roll when he got back to figure out what they were doing in the meantime.
I like the idea of a custom move for players returning from absence. It gets them into the action, and decides what befell them while the others were slogging it through the World.
With two players, it was very intimate, and the two characters got a lot of chances to get into all kinds of trouble. Advances also happened a lot quicker, with only two players, the rate of advancement jumped quite a bit, and by the end each had 2 improvements. Lemieux explored some of the driver moves, and JC got Harder. We did play over 5 hours, with a couple of breaks. Does that sound about right, in terms of improvement?
I got them to make a lot more rolls, and tried to go as hard as I could when missed. However, they also have horseshoes shoved up their asses, because a lot of the rolls were 10s and 12s, except harm, which were 3's and 4's.
They're now heading into Ungiven future territory, moving into session 5 next week. They're both really excited about that, and discussing where their advancements are going to go.
It was recorded, and I'll try to get the recording up in the next day or three. It's been tremendous fun, and things are yet aginst different. No Status is Quo!
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Tonight's latest session was amazing, but I committed the criminal act of not recording it. I've lost my recorder, which is a source of great consternation! I might have to resort to using my laptop or something in the future.
Big things happened in this session. Here are a couple of highlights.
Lemieux repaired a CB Radio antenna, cannibalizing most of the dirtbikes to get the parts he needed. I had recently made the Psychic Maelstrom a threat in the form of a landscape (a mirage), and I made a threat move for it to reveal something.
Normally CB radios have 40 channels. This CB radio was now able to go to channel 41. When Lemieux clicked to channel 41, he found that he could speak with those that had died along the way. He proceeded to have a conversation with King Millions and then Penny's mother. This intense strangeness causes Lemieux to abandon the Savvyhead path and wander off into the desert, returning as a scantily clad Battlebabe (Lemieux had advanced and was unsure what to take, and the situation was perfect for choosing a new character class). He took visions of death as his battlebabe move as "he has spoken to the dead."
My second move was when Lemieux and Goldie were trying to find Penny in Roverville, and I decided that Harrow, JC's pet cannibal was going to pull a threat move. I made it quite subtle but very dangerous, Penny getting her cigarette lit (the Cigarette was given to her earlier by JC) by Harrow, using a lighter, in a dark part of Roverville's RVs. (Grotesque move - Threaten someone, directly or by implication)
Goldie completely flips out and proceeded to kill him, using her crowbar to bash his head in. (Taking by Force) though not before he stabbed her in the sides with his carving knives, which were partially deflected, but (due to a 10 on the harm move) still quite damaging. Harrow is then thrown onto a bonfire and the bikers dance around it. They hated Harrow for a while now, and having him dead represents a big morale boost to the bikers.
This sparked a rather vocal discussion between JC and Goldie. Harrow was part of JC's crew, and it broke one of the rules they had established regarding each other's gangs. JC asked for "A life for a life", to which Goldie immediately offered Blues. JC
agrees.
Lemieux and Goldie then plan to sabotage Blue's bike. JC didn't mean for them to kill Blues, he wanted Blues to replace Harrow. However, all the players agreed that the miscommunication would depend on whether or not JC can read the situation properly and correct the misconception. JC fails the roll, and the miscommunication stands.
It serves to contract the characters nicely. JC's definition of a life for a life was a replacement asset for an asset lost, and Goldie and Lemieux see it as "an eye for an eye".
Lemieux sneaks up to the bike and makes the adjustments quickly (Acting under fire) while Goldie attempts to distract her girls from their bikes, retelling the story of the Cannibals over the bones of Harrow. (also acting under fire).
Lemieux succeeds, but Goldie fails. I have a few of the girls see Lemieux, but do nothing. This puts them complicit in Blue's eventual fate. Goldie refers this assassination as "The worst kept secret in the gang".
Then I perform some truly awful fuckery. Goldie orders Blues AND Juck to scout ahead. Neither return. When Goldie heads down the road, she sees that Blues vehicle lost control, and careened into Juck's bike. Both men were now dead.
Again, Goldie gets what she wants, but I twisted it. In addition, a few of the gang know that Goldie set up Blues to die, and in the process had Juck, a relative innocent to this dispute in the gang, killed as well.
What makes this worse is that not only is Goldie complicit in Juck's death, but so are the gang members that saw the sabotage and did nothing.
This move, to turn her move back on her, was happily well recieved by the players. I was afraid to do this particular fuckery, but once JC and Goldie failed their moves, I felt that the situation demanded some hard moves in return.
A failed roll is a powerful thing. It gives me the permission necessary to make a move like this, and not make a player think that they have been cheated in some way. I gave Lemieux what he wanted, and yet twisted it a bit to reflect Goldie's failure.
All in all, it was a fantastic session. I was constantly amazed at how much happened over the course of the evening, and we only played about 4-5 hours total. As I get better at the necessary MC moves and principles, I find the game just keeps getting better.
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And it keeps getting better. The biggest problem with our games is that we keep playing a little longer, a little longer, and then suddenly it's a quarter to 2 in the morning, and we realize that we've been playing almost 6 hours. The game is so much fun that we're having difficulties stopping play, and having to wait another week to get back into it.
It's a great problem to have.
I think that the last few sessions have allowed us to talk about the value of opening your brain, and the psychic maelstrom in general. In the Apocalypse World, I keep the world real, unrelenting, and visceral. What the Opening Your Brain move does for us is dwell, for a bit, in unreality. To play around with metaphor a bit, and examine the characters from the inside. We've used a lot of dreamlike imagery for this, and kept it in the air as to whether this is psychic messages from the dead, or simple introspection from the mind's own conjured images. It's great, and allows us to do some neat stuff involving the character connections.
Two notable moments involving Opening the Brain occurred between Goldie and Lemieux, and JC and Penny. Goldie had been badly injured in a fight against Hugo's forces, which included an ancient tank. She had been knocked unconscious early in the fight, (a 10 on my harm move) and was sitting at 9:00 harm. Goldie was also suffering from the terrible injuries suffered by her girls, Diamond and Lars walked stiffly from bullet wounds, Fleece and Wires lay dead on the ground.
Goldie was unresponsive from the shock of injuries and losing more of her Girls (the pain from Juck, and a lesser extent Blues was pretty fresh), and this was partially a result of some discussion between me and Daniel, the player.
Daniel had decided to take a second character, and wanted to play the girl Penny. Penny after training from the Girls, and after the massive battle against Hugo, where she came into her own. Penny, the 13 year old Gunlugger. He wanted to play Penny for a bit to find his own voice for her, changed as she was in the midst of that massive battle, and wanted Goldie to be kind of out of commission for a bit while he focused on playing Penny.
When Lemieux opened his brain, he was able to gain some important information about Goldie. Her mental state, some of her deep seated longings and fears. It also allowed Lemieux to show some context of Lemieux and Goldie's relationship, and a moment of something untainted by the shit of the Apocalypse World, the purity of love between the two characters. It was something that they could only admit in the Brain Opening, not something they can talk about in the grim reality around them.
JC and Penny were another example of opening their brains. Penny had unresolved issues regarding JC's murder of her mother. There was several altercations between the two, as they circled each other warily. Penny's read of JC led to her realizing that JC's "Dream" was a lie, but one that JC desperately wants to believe (A result "Is your character telling the truth and What is your character really feeling), and this led to the Brain Opening, to find out if the dream can exist, if the places on JC's postcards are real.
It was a powerful moment. After a bit of discussion, the dream and these places can only exist to those who have come to some sort of peace with the ugliness inside of them, who have some sort of fundamental spark of humanity. That the problem with the dream is that there are people who have surrendered to that ugliness, and the notion of a family, a unit of people who support each other physically and emotionally, are what is needed to transport the dream from a lie to the truth.
Again, it wasn't something they could articulate in the awful reality, but the Maelstrom can give them the words and images they needed to communicate the fundamental importance of the Dream being about the people, not the location.
They were a pair of powerful scenes, and they really focused the tenor of the game. The characters are fighting against the ugliness in themselves and others, and with some Advanced Moves getting purchased with advances, they finally had the weapons to fight.
And man, the Manipulate/Seduce move with advanced Moves have done some incredible things to the game. More on that in a bit.
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Great and powerful stuff. I really wish you still had an audio recorder so I could listen in to the entire session.
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Don't worry about that! We have almost every session recorded, and they're being edited for release. Last session got cut off towards the end, but I got most of the session. I'll have them up as soon as I clean up the audio a bit, and remove some of our digresssions and washroom breaks.
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That's great news, fantastic! I am very much looking forward to hearing more of "Gamma Road Radio." :)
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Seconded on the eagerness to hear more Gamma Road. As someone who has done most of his gaming via message boards and similar media, I get a huge kick out of the different voices (and Lemieux's hammy French-Canadian accent) and the banter that makes it so clear that all are having a great time.
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All right! Here's the next recording (http://www.archive.org/details/YouCanHackitAP2). There was no Daniel, and therefore no Goldie, so it was a lot of Lemieux and JC interactions.
I had a lot of fun playing Harrow the Cannibal and having him do various horrible things, and then JC and Lemieux argue about keeping him alive. Good times!
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Downloading it now, very much looking forward to listening to it.
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Another session ended last night, and it was great. Session 7 resulted in Lemieux opening his brain and discovering the Truth of the Psychic Maelstrom, which I had given some thought about, and hinted at last game.
In addition, this also represented massive changes in both JC and Goldie, both of who changed their playbooks at the end of the game. There was sex, beauty, horrible violence, and hope.
It's all recorded, but I have a backlog of Actual play recording to get through, and I'm going to try to get most of them out this week. I also want to put up my relationship map, which is becoming a barely legible scribble of dense interpersonal ties.
There was one moment where JC was trying to stop the blood sport in the holding Cal's Catastrophe. He tries to reason with Goldie on this, as she rather pragmatically looks at the chanting crowd and (reading a charged situation) realizes that they'll riot if they don't get their daily intake of gladiatorial combat. JC starts to go on and on about baseball, and starts describing it. (riffing on Blast from the Past) Halfway through his description he kind of trails off, realizing how incredibly silly baseball sounds when describing it to someone, Goldie looks at him as if he's insane, and all of us at the table are almost crying from laughing.
There was this great moment involving a successful Augury move, Lemieux projecting lost images of children playing on this image of the Florida Keys, pulled from an old viewmaster. This was shown to the baying crowd to abate their bloodlust. The Augury move was intended to show some of the Maelstrom, a deep part of it, and it made the image real, the sound of the children, of the ocean, and the smell of the ocean, and even the pounding of the surf come through. As the image faded, it left behind sand, and one of the tall trees by the beach. The holding was changed by the Maelstrom's touch, and then began to worship the tree left behind.
Immediately after this beautiful moment, the gang triumphed against the Holding's forces. They were battling at the entrance to the holding, as a result of Goldie and JC's earlier efforts. Goldie bore witness to Lars, emerging triumphant from the battlefield, holding a dead guard's severed head high and tossing it at her feet, a trophy from a victorious battle. The juxtaposition of a miracle of the Maelstrom mixed with the ugly reality of this world was great, and quite horrifying.
There was a collapsing bridge in the holding, where each player acted under fire, Goldie and Lemieux helped each other to safety, and JC saved Lars, one of the Chopper gang. It was a fairly standard hard move (previously there was a failed roll, so I picked one of the landscape moves) but each decision in the Act under Fire, specifically with Goldie and JC, was a result of the gut wrenching events that happened earlier in the game.
It was great, very satisfying, and I look forward to when next we play.
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I've been working on getting my recorded sessions out of editing hell and into the world. In order to get all of the actual play sessions out, I've been taking to removing mainly longer gaps and cleaning up the audio quality.
At any rate, here's the next installment (http://www.archive.org/details/YouCanHackitAP3)! You have a few choices for audio at this site.