RPGaDay 22: Perfect Gaming Environment

This can be taken a couple of ways.

First, the physical. My preference is for somewhere quiet and whilst not isolated, let's say that at least you don't want people barging in to ask what you're doing. Quiet is good to, because I don't really like having to shout or talk over people, in part because I think interrupting people is just rude.

Secondly, for me there has to be an element of respect between players, and a willingness to jump in and share ideas even if you think you might look silly. So the environment has to be able to foster that, too.

RPGaDay 21: Favourite Gaming Setting

Wow, another hard one.

I think that when I have to think it through, this could be a lot of games, L5R, Warhammer Fantasy, the World of Darkness in general. That being said, I think my favourite setting at the moment is the Unknown Armies one, even though I've only read the game, not played it.

What I like is the absence of things outside of humanity; even vampires are myth in comparison to the various cabals and general weirdness that populates the game. The humanistic element is important to me, as is the fact that magic, bluntly, fucks you up. It's also the only game I know that truly embraces the outsider without shoehorning them directly into a faction or club, which is nice if you want to run a game about people surviving on their own without being screwed over. World of Darkness is good at saying if you don't belong you'll struggle, even as it feeds the romance of being outside the system. UA doesn't do that, if anything it takes the view that you start at the outside, and that's your purest state; joining a club will inevitably cost you something.

RPGaDay: Favourite Horror Game

There's only one option for me on this one; Mage the Ascension.

Whilst on the surface it seems to be the least horrific of the old World of Darkness games, to me it has a number of advantages over even the other World of Darkness games. In part that's because it isn't about being a monster in the literal sense, or about things that are so arcane it sometimes isn't that clear how they intersect with the rest of the world. In Mage everything boils down to us, normal humanity, and the extremes we can go to. I like that there's no real 'good' side in the Ascension War, only which one will screw us over the least. No mater which set of Mages win we could lose. As with the other games in the line, there are attractive options to play, but you can never quite shake the feeling that all the factions would be insufferable if they won.

From the perspective of playing the game I'm fond of the fact that at one level the game gives you access to more or less unlimited power, if you can work out how to use it, but at the same time makes you have to consider how to use it without pulling a lot of pain down onto yourself. Paradox is a powerful tool, one that ties really well into the rest of the game.

This is what really makes it a horror game to me, that knowledge that you could do anything, be anything and yet we choose to dwell the way we do. That's powerful.

RPGaDay 19: Favourite Superhero Game

Today its all about superheroes.

And since I've only played one official superhero game, ignoring the way that whole 'supers with fangs' thing that World of Darkness games were able to slip into if you didn't give it too much thought, that means Mutants and Masterminds is my pick by default.

I've not played much of it and to be honest it didn't work that well for me. I always take it as a bad sign when you can't remember the system when you're the GM and... well yeah. That said the small game we played was fun before I just got to the point where the rules felt like they'd never by my friend and I was just struggling to keep things straight in my head. Nonetheless the heroes took on the Crime Circus and a sort of evil Fantastic Four before I gave up.

RPGaDay 18: Favourite Science Fiction Game

There's only one answer I can give to this category: Atomic Highway.

A post apocalyptic game, with a light system and a devil may care attitude towards setting (it's very much a toolkit which assumes there's been a nuclear war and humanity is starting to recover in a world that's stranger than it ever was before), Atomic Highway covers the bases and throws in some sweet treats to make things interesting. Character generation is based on a background (nomad, rancher, remnant etc, which reflects how your character was raised) and then adds a job to it, rounding out skills and equipment. The system is a dice pool in which you spend your skill points to raise dice rolls to six. Naturally rolled sixes can be rerolled to garner further successes. It's a fun twist on a pretty standard mechanic.

The lack of setting is a boon, as it allows you to cook up your own. Mine sat at the edge of the Great American Desert, around a town that had sprung up from an old motorway (freeway) services. We didn't play for long but what we did play was fun and the system was surprisingly easy to comprehend and rather brutal in its own way; the action points provided a way to stave off death rather than do lots of cool things. The players usually spent them to halve the damage they'd taken from their enemies. I like it too, because the nature of the game allows you to go whacky without it being too weird - giant animals and insects are part of the setting, as are mutants and other forms of oddness. It also allowed me to throw in weird communities and gangs, which were all good plot fodder.

RPGaDay 17: Favourite Fantasy Game

As I'm playing catch up I thought I'd plough on and post the next category today too; my favourite fantasy game.

Fantasy, as many people who read my other blog, Shores of Night, will know is a difficult category for me because at times it feels too historical, and at times not enough. Often it feels as if the whole genre, especially in RPGs, boils down to 'the Wild West with spells, monsters, and ancient ruins. I tend to look outside of that for my fantasy fix and have a soft spot for Yggdrasil, Exalted, despite the rules set, Runequest, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and Legend of the Five Rings. Of these, the ones I've played enough of know what they're really like are the last two and I find it hard to pick between them.

I love Warhammer for the sense of the Old World and the Empire. They feel like real, living places and as if they are in the midst of change. Being modelled on a real place helps because it grounds the world into a more realistic place, one where you know that drinking the water is a bad idea (Phil,  our GM, worried that we'd all end up as alcoholics because we always ordered beer, unwilling to take the chance of cholera or dysentry). On top of that the world is built on idea that actually work, there are reasons why the Empire hasn't fallen to wizards, reasons why monsters infest the dark forests. It's not like D&D where you often wonder why adventurers retire to open taverns when they could buy and sell most kingdoms because of the amount of dragon loot they're lugging about. Add to that the fact that I love the Skaven (no idea why) and Chaos is one of the most interesting antagonists I've seen in games, and well I'm pretty much sold.

I like the system, too. The core mechanic is simple and the careers mean that its more engaging than a class system.



Legend of the Five Rings, on the other hand, scratches another itch; my 'we're not in Kansas anymore' itch. Rokugan is weird and alien, and interesting. It forces people to think in different ways and look at the world, the game world, differently. I like the fact that money is largely unimportant, player characters aren't scrabbling around after coins in the hope of making tonight's rent. I like the schools and the different techniques that they teach; it makes the characters feel fresh and interesting, rather than everyone being the same. As with Warhammer, the mythology the game's built on feels interesting and I have a soft spot for the Nezumi (rat people are apparently one of my weaknesses when it comes to gaming, but I always did like anthro stuff).

I'm not so sold on the system, finding it hard to balance fights; one of the combats in my game saw an ogre taken down in one round, and I always found it hard to make combat work in terms of challenging the players enough to keep things interesting but not pushing them so far into a position of weakness they needed to be bailed out. That was, by and large, my only issue with it though, despite some snafus with the magic system.



I love the way both the games look too. They have unique approaches that are both very evocative; neither are vanilla. Just the sight of that orange mohican on a Troll Slayer's head catches my interest, in the same way that the simplicity of the L5R cover does. Their interior art is just as beautiful and imaginative, whether its a scholar's candle hat in WFRP or the various samurai pictures in L5R (of which there are too many for me to just pick one).

In terms of good memories, WFRP wins, but from aesthetic appreciation I go the other way. to L5R, and I'm not sure I can choose an outright winner. So I'm afraid I'm going to sit on the fence and declare it a draw.

RPGaDay 16: Longest Game Session Played

Back in March 1995 I ran a game of Mage at my student house. The players came as their characters and were, from memory, a Hollow One, an Order of Hermes Mage and his cat familiar, and a Son of Ether scientist. They gathered to investigate something or other, I forget what the plot was to be honest, but I do remember the Hermetic electing to carry a stout hickory stick at one point, and  I'm pretty sure it all related to the Umbra.

We gamed for about seven hours, if I remember right, taking the adventure from start to finish and it was fun. It was probably the first time I'd run Mage and I daresay it was slipshod and a bit iffy in places, as these things are wont to be (but so what, I think everyone enjoyed themselves).

RPGaDay Triple Shot: Favourite Pod Cast, Gaming Accessory, and Longest Game Played

Today is a three shot, because I missed yesterday for a friend's 40th birthday party, and will spend most of tomorrow travelling for a job interview. As I'm already lagging behind... I thought I'd cheat and lay do a bigger post.

Day Thirteen also presents me with a conundrum... I don't listen to podcasts so I've never heard any of the numerous gaming ones out there. The closest I got was listening to the recordings of Masks of Nyarlethotep that I bought at the UK Games Expo a few years a go. So I guess that's my default. In the meantime, if you have any podcasts you love then please post a link in the comments so I can have a listen.

Day Fourteen is my favourite gaming accessory and this is easy. A few years ago I commissioned a dice cup from Jacklyn Hyde, and it is glorious. Part of the attraction is that I got it made to my specifications so purple leather with a dragon design; and big enough to take all the d10s and d6s you'd need to play something like Shadowrun or Werewolf the Apocalypse.

I'd also like to say that All Rolled Ups are wonderful and would have been my choice, if I hadn't gone for the dice cup.



Day Fifteen is the longest running game I've been in, which was a game of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay my friend Phil ran over a number of years. A small group of us (three player characters, an elf, a dwarf and a human) foiled a Skaven plot in the Empire, and fought a Liche under the Grey Mountains, among many other things.

RPGaDay12:Favourite piece of RPG Art

Today's favourite is are and predictably I've gone with Vampire. I love this image as it sums up the erotic nature of vampires perfectly for me (I also like that its a female vampire being all seductive, we need more of those).

The Old City

An old document I found on my PC. It'll see light in some of my fiction, albeit in a slightly different form and it's a bit scrappy here. I hope you enjoy, nonetheless. 

The City

There's a city, old but not yet ancient, with step pyramids and stone mansions, surrounded by lower grade buildings and mud huts. The twin lion gods, one a lord of light and fire, the other of darkness, the hunt and warfare, are worshipped here; appeased by human sacrifices. Criminals are bent backwards over the altars, their hearts cut from their chests and burnt with sweet incenses.

The city is huge, housing half a million people and divided into three areas, the central and highest section is the Old City, dedicated to the temples, although most of them stand abandoned, and palaces of the rich and powerful. This is surrounded by a wall, one built since the Queen took over the city. Beyond that is the second part of the city, a bustling section of the metropolis that's full of bazaars. The outer ring of the city is composed of slums, shanty towns and bone yards. There is no wall to protect the city from outside. A huge aqueduct leads from the west from the city, transporting water to farmland and to the closest of the Queen's captured cities.

The city is built on the ruins of older metropolises, and the tunnels under the city teem with creatures, including giant scorpions.

Places

• The Great Temple – Set at the highest point of the city, doubling as a palace for the Queen, this imposing building is dedicated to the twins, crowned by a huge ziggurat to them.
• The Abandoned Temples – Also filling the Inner City, these structures have stood silent and empty for a century. Their contents are untouched, attempts to steal from them are common and guardian sphinxes protect the treasures within.
• The Arena – A great arena in the Middle City. Gladiators are often purchased as concubines by the elite's women, under the pretext of them being body slaves.
• The Slave Market – In the Middle City, where many slaves are sold. There are many such markets in the city, but the greatest is adjunct to the Grand Bazaar.
• The Grand Bazaar – The greatest of the bazaars, full of merchants from across the World.
• The Gardens – Located in the Inner City, the Gardens were created at the birth of the city and are counted as a wonder of the world
• The Wall – surrounding the Inner City
• The Plague Pits – Located to the south, this is where the dead of the Great Plague were places. It's still believed that the dead carry the contagion of the Plague. Lately it has become the home of ghouls and other monsters.
• The Square of Gods – a place where the underground cults gather to proselytise.
• The Undercity – where the old city lay, now built over countless times.
• The Docks – Lining the Spine, the docks bring trade to the city.
• The Pumping House – where the water from the River (the spine of the world) is pumped up into the city through great stone channels.
• The Wheel House – a vast waterwheel that drives some of the devices in the Outer City.
• The Boiler House – a vast steam works where river water is heated to power devices in the city. This drives devices in the Inner City.
• The Lizard Kin Embassy – Inner City, a strange, alien looking building covered in brightly coloured lacquer.
• Farms along the banks of the river, growing food.

Languages

There are a number of tongues spoken in the City, principally the High and Low languages native to the metropolis. The High tongue is used for science, ritual and government, whilst the Low is the language of the streets, trade and warfare.

The Lizard Kin tongue, a sibilant tongue of hissing sounds for the most part, is also a common thing to hear.

There is little writing, most texts are memorised by heart and passed down orally. Writing is reserved for royalty and deities, as a way of preserving their names eternally.

Defence and Crime

The City only gained its own, standing, army in the wake of the Queen's victory. Beyond that it was guarded by a citizen's militia, which is where most of its troops come from today. There are professional warriors though, in the form of the Pride and the Warrior Societies that have grown up. The societies protect the Inner City and also perform duties that relate to military exercises other than defence. At least one skirts the edge of heresy; its rituals are secretly dedicated to one of the other gods.

Weaponry tends to be spears, javelins, bows and arrows and daggers (there are no swords). In the arena there are variations on this, new weapons are trialled for the crowd's amusement. These vary from cat claw like punching daggers, strapped to the backs of the wielder's hands to modified agricultural and fishing tools (flails, nets and tridents).

Armour is non existent for many combatants, the professional warriors wear leather tunics covered with riveted bronze and copper plates but the majority of soldiers fight either clad in a loincloth or naked.

For the most part cavalry is unheard of (there are exceptions but the lack of stirrups limits the use of such troops), but war chariots are coming into their own, thanks to the development of 'chariot armour' that protects both driver and warrior.

Out on the streets, the citizenry are policed by the City Guards, a newly created group which has evolved from the old Citizen's Watch. This Watch is usually armed with long cudgels and large shields.

The criminal underworld is not controlled by a thieves guild, but instead several gangs work against each other to try and control parts of the city. Bandits and river pirates operate outside the city, preying on trade caravans and ships on the Spine.

The Queen

The city is ruled by a queen priest, a conquering heroine, whose horde of soldiers swept into the city and put all the opposition to the sword a century ago. She claims to be the daughter of one of the twin gods, or of both of them. She brought the deities with her and gave the city to them after her conquest. She makes regular appearances in the city, but nobody alive has ever seen her face; she hides it behind a beautiful mask of pure gold. She is guarded at all times by her Pride, her personal guard who are rumoured to be her lovers as well. She is certainly a keen supporter of the city's tradition of polyandry, going so far as to bless multiple weddings in the great square in front of the great temple.

She is a cruel, but fair ruler, sustained by the sacrifices offered to the gods but willing to share her power with her followers, granting divine powers to her priests and champions in times of need, encouraging learning. All it takes is acceptance of her divinity: entry into her fathers' cult. The nobility, who have traditionally been members of the Council of Advisers that support the King Priest are all members of the cult; those that refused to join were put aside, and about half the Council is composed of the Twin Gods' high priests. The majority of the city's bureaucracy is handled by the Queen's cult, noble families who once shared power have been ousted and isolated, which breeds resentment in their ranks. It is only fear of the Queen that keeps them in check.

No other cults are tolerated, they have been driven underground, to lurk in the ghettos of the outer city; their temples stand empty, gathering dust. Their gods have grown smaller, quieter. Perhaps in another century they will have fallen silent: in the meantime they find their worshippers where they may. In the outer city a square has been co-opted by the cults, their priests proselytise here, operating from tiny, makeshift shrines. There are regular raids, with harsh punishments meted out for the rebel priests.

Other Gods

Despite the interdict on the worship of other gods, or Yazadi (meaning 'worthy of worship'), their cults blossom underground, either surviving amongst the poor or hidden in the ranks of aspirational classes. For instance the Anack the Builder God's worshippers are enmeshed in the Mason's Guild, hidden from the gaze of the outside world.

The First Goddess: A Creatrix and river Goddess, she is the deity that was first worshipped in the city. She is depicted in many ways, usually as a composite of woman and reptile. In older depictions she is shown as having the hind quarters of a dragon, in more modern versions she often has wings and a tail.

Her provinces are Creation, Water and Motherhood

Mattaki The War Dancer: Originating from a city to the south and east, he is a deity of fire, fertility, dance and war. Depicted as a youth with fiery hair, usually clad in bronze armour but barefoot either holding a large horn or a pair of spears, his cult has a strong tradition of performance and athletics.

Anack the Building God: A stone skinned giant, often shown as crouching amidst a huge palace. Anack is seen as the father of mathematics and geometry. His cult does not preach in the Square of Gods, and of all the old faiths it stands the closest to being accepted if only because the knowledge he specialises in is so vital. It is said that the stone skinned demons that occasionally make their way into the world are Anack's creation, his labourers who rebelled and were cast out into the Howling Darkness.

Anushka The Storm Goddess: Shown with a drum and with her ankles and wrists girded with bracelets and anklets that make sound, Anushka's cult grew up in the north in a mountain city. Another dancing deity, her rhythms and dance is meant to conjure storms and other weather. Only women may enter her cult.

Tammuz The Agriculture God: A consort of the First Goddess (one of the many), the God of Corn is eternally wounded. His blood is said to give life.

Syssallar The Lizard God: Father of the Lizard Kin and another of the First Goddess' lovers. His cult is open only to the Lizard Kin.

Marris The Goddess of Arts: Shown as a young woman with an army of lovers each of whom has an artistic tool, she is shown as the ultimate muse full of beauty and character. Of all the human gods she attracts the most worshippers from the non human races.

The Cat Lord: A cat headed deity from the far south, he is lord of many things, most especially cleanliness, protection and medicine. A household deity for the most part, he is invoked to keep rats away from home, to keep disease at bay and heal the sick. He is often shown sat under a pair of trees, which are considered to be the bearers of the fruit that can cure any illness.

The World At Large

The queen's reign is good for trade, mercenaries escort ships, both human and lizard kin, from up and down the great river that forms the spine of the world. Across the plains that lead eastward to where the ocean lies come spices, silks and gold, whilst south and west the jungles that the queen hails from, a tribute of sacred leopards is brought every year, to prowl the wondrous gardens at the city's heart. The Sons of the Sky, savants who keep secrets that men must never know, who travel from their mountain fastnesses to the north in search of things that they will not speak of.

This does not mean that all is tranquil, or safe. There are noble families who remember the days when their station meant something, before the priesthood snatched their power away. There are guilds that will do anything if the price is right and in the bazaars and the temples there are treasures worth stealing, worth killing for. Strangers seek the city out, in vengeance for the queen's latest war or for the purposes of trade, or politics; other cities still keep their eyes fixed here, waiting for the twin gods, or their daughter to decide that she must be an empress no a queen. Still others come because dreams and visions guide them, because they have no choice but to do otherwise.

The Queen's Reach

The Queen has conquered four other city states, holding them in thrall. This generally means that she takes tribute from them, but otherwise they are left to run their own affairs, still it is an empire in all but name. Two border the river, one lies westward and the other lies south, on an island in the gulf where the Spine spills out into the sea.

A tribe of raiders from the deserts, where the women ride horses – they use javelins and bows and arrows.

Ruins of an old city, one built by demons at the behest of a Sorcerer King. It became ruins when he tried to corral the Demon Queen. She cursed the King and his acolytes, transforming them into monsters. Today the place is rumoured to be haunted by the old king, now transformed into a manticore. The other monsters are believed to scattered across the World.

Other Races

The Sky Sons are a race of giants, standing ten feet tall. They dwell in the mountains to the north and seem to have no real interest in the world beyond the acquisition of knowledge. Most never leave their homes, but a trickle head south to the city, usually seeking something. They seem to view much of the world with amusement and will trade knowledge for food, though they are often more interested in a like for like exchange. Their sole weakness seems to be for human women, there are stories of how one gave up all his learning for a night with a beautiful woman and it is as a result of their lust that the Nephilim came to be.

The Nephilim are barbarous creatures, huge giants with either great strength or intellect, coupled with a terrible hunger that mars their approach to everything. They are cursed with low willpower, said to be a mark of the disfavour of the Sky Sons, and often will stop what they are doing to pursue their vice. Most are mules, sterile, but there are rumours of some that can procreate and that they are breeding huge armies in the mountains to the north. Rumours say that Nephilim are stealing out of their camps to abduct women and carry them back to the mountains.

The Lizard Kin are a race of brightly coloured beings, covered in patterned scales. Their cities lie to the south but they're a common sight in the city, though it is mostly males that venture north. Females tend to be larger than males and can be extremely aggressive in their dealings with other races (there is a rumour that they eat humans when given the chance). Most females are marked by twin sacks of flesh on their necks that redden when they are angry or aroused. Few are poisonous, it is considered a great boon to have a venomous bite, and an even greater one to be able to spit poison.