Revelation 2023

It was a bit nerve wracking going back to the Garrison, as the last time I was there, five of us caught covid. Somehow this manifested in an unusually high level of organisation, and I managed to leave early enough on Friday to beat the rush hour and was in the bar shortly after 5pm. Unfortunately, nobody else was. It wasn't until 9.30pm that a few more people arrived and the socialising began.

Normality resumed on Saturday morning though, as even with a few illness-related drop-outs we had a good crowd in the jailhouse ready to play.

Game 1: Kult

Having made these cool handouts for my scenario, A Walk In The Park, I had to run it a few times. I had three players booked, and had modified the scenario to run with three players instead of four, but with the last minute drop-outs I figured I should be ready in case there was someone in need of a game, and printed the fourth character as well. And there was indeed someone in need of a game, so things ran with the normal four players.

This game gets a bit of a tweak each time I run it, which in this case meant I'd added back in some of the characters' disadvantages. This makes a bit more work for me, but things tend to run faster offline than online, so it's doable, and I think it adds a little more depth to the characters. I still might tweak them further, but I'm really happy with how things went.

I also did a bunch of laminating this time. Laminated character sheets worked out well for this, as marking stability and conditions with dry wipe pens made it a lot easier to erase things as they changed. I might need a slightly finer pen for writing in wounds, but otherwise this is working really well and should save me a lot of printing for scenarios I run multiple times.

Game 2: Apocalypse World

I loved the TV show Blood Drive and it's a great fit for Apocalypse World, so I was pretty damn excited about this one.

I've played with the same GM before, and played a Brainer both times, but since we were going for a different setting this time, I decided it was time to branch out a bit. Inspired a little by the character of Grace in the TV show, I picked up the Battlebabe. One of the playbook moves for the Battlebabe is having such great reflexes that you're considered to have 2 armour providing you're naked or nearly naked, so I decided she was dressed in wedding lingerie with a tiara and veil. Continuing that theme, I picked two custom weapons, a massive handgun and a bladed chain, and named them the Best Man and the Maid of Honour.

Then we had to decide if any of us were teaming up in the race and sharing a car. One player, who'd picked up the Brainer, had described his character wearing a leather tuxedo, and that just felt like fate. So Sunset and Scratch in their luxurious Rolls Royce with added spikes, were racing against Mustang the Driver and Barbarossa the Gunlugger in their armoured coupe.

The race route was unveiled, and the GM asked us what was so bad about the town we were going to have to drive through. Cannibals, one of the players said, and thus we created Hungry Bowel Town, where every building looked like a pizza hut, where trenches filled with dips and dressings bordered the roads, and a moat of burning barbecue charcoal surrounded the outside edge.

As expected, we were forced to stop off in Hungry Bowel Town when our engines stopped working. Scratch and Sunset went into a basement, as Scratch was sure the problem was coming from beneath us, while Mustang and Barbarossa went into the town centre where they found a statue of a giant chicken. And suddenly everything started making a horrible sense. This place had been built by a fast food company, and had been called Hungry Fowl Town, until the weirdness from the Scar had made everything go wrong.

Anyway, the statue was actually a mask for a giant chicken man, and once Scratch had killed him with mind powers we were able to leave. The other car had drawn ahead, and tried to stop us. There was a bit of an incident with a grenade launcher, resulting in both Barbarossa and Scratch exploding. Mustang got into the Rolls and entirely failed to convince me to drive away, so I put the Best Man to his head and told him to get out, then drove away and won the race.

Fortunately both Scratch and Barbarossa had recovered from exploding, so I was able to spend my prize money on a wedding dress so we could finally have a proper wedding.

Game 3: Kult

Unfortunately the GM for the Saturday evening game of Kult had to pull out, so I offered a second run of A Walk In The Park. Again I picked up another player from another cancelled game, which was lucky as one of the original players also had to drop, so I ended up with three players for this round.

Another entertaining run, with a different ending to the morning game. There are two general directions the end can take on this one, and it was good to get both of them in one day.

Game 4: Thirsty Sword Lesbians

This was me GMing again. Only my second time running this game (with the first being the practice run for this scenario), but I was pretty excited to see how it was going to go. It feels strange going into a session without much in the way of pre-written material, but it really works for this one.

My pitch was Robyn Hood and her Merry Maids, and I'd picked six suitable playbooks for feminised versions of the most popular characters from various versions of Robin Hood. With four players, this meant plenty of choice even for whoever picked last, plus two characters who could be NPCs for the game.

By way of plot I had six situations for the players to choose from, and they ultimately combined two. Robyn Hood and Alanna Dale had been captured and were imprisoned in Nottingham Castle, where there was also a high society wedding happening. They went in to do a rescue mission, but decided that they had to do something about the wedding as well.

By the end of the session, the Merry Maids had got away with both the brides from the wedding, two guardswomen, a lot of jewellery and a dog. Highlights included Briar Tuck managing to marry two people simultaneously, then swing on a chandelier through a stained glass window and landing on a horse outside, Jill Scarlet sliding down a curtain using a knife to slow her fall and using the remains to make a new dress for Lady Marian, Dutch the Miller's Daughter taking out half the castle by smashing a lantern to set the dungeon on fire and sending flaming rats in all directions, and Little Joan managing to so thoroughly humiliate the Sherriff of Nottingham that he was forced to let them all escape.

I could use a little more practice running this system, as I'm still getting used to the GM moves, but overall this was exactly the kind of swashbuckling romance I was hoping for. I hope to offer this one again at future conventions.

Game 5: Apocalypse World

This was supposed to be A|State, but we'd lost enough players by then that it wasn't really viable. Fortunately the GM for an Apocalypse World game based on Metro 2033 had brought enough playbooks to take on an extra player so I joined that instead.

I picked up the Gunlugger this time, as I was getting a bit tired and figured that would be reasonably uncomplicated. That turned out to be a good choice. I inadventently caused early chaos by shooting someone I really shouldn't have, but later managed to punch another character back to life after an encounter with a supernatural smoke cloud.

The playbooks we were using for this were the ones from 1st edition, which had significantly more complicated rules for determining Hx with the other PCs. After some confusion, particularly for people like me who've only ever seen the 2nd edition playbooks before, we abandoned that and used the 2nd edition version to sort out the numbers. While a lot for my tired brain to deal with at the time, it was very interesting to see how the game had evolved between versions.

Reflections

Covid has done a number on my stamina. Normally five games in two days would be no trouble at all and I'd still be full of keen by the end of game 5. This time not so much. I had enough energy left for the two hour drive home, thankfully, but after that I was completely wiped out. Fortunately I find running games to be energising, so I should do OK at Seven Hills where my games are currently scheduled for the final slot of each day, and Concrete Cow where I'm planning to GM in the evening slot. But the prospect of having to pace myself at conventions is not an encouraging one. I have to hope this is only temporary.