The Social Ending

When I was an undergrad in college I had to read a book. As most books classes make you read it wasn't one I would pick on my own, but I found myself getting invested in the tale. It was about a young person and their relationship with an older man they called Sensei. Not a lot happened - as is the case IMO for a lot of literary fiction - but the drama of the everyday lives was enough. And then the main character's father fell ill, they had to choose between going back home or staying in the city. If they went they'd be there for their father, but their life in the city with Sensei would be over. If they stayed, they would miss their father's death and be abandoning their family in a time of need. I was riveted. Finally something huge was happening and I needed to know what was going on. Then I turned the page and found myself staring at the back blank cover of the novel, jacket giving the author information.

To say I was upset is a mild understatement. I was so annoyed a day later when we met for discussion that the teacher gave me bonus points as I was clearly the only one to finish the book on time.

I bring this up now because I just had a table top RPG end the exact same way, only I find myself ok with it. Today I want to talk about it.

A Good Death

I play in a friend of a friend's online D&D campaign on Roll 20. I joined it fairly recently all things considered, and we've been going through the book campaign Tyranny of the Dragon Queen or whatever it is officially called. We normally meet on Sundays, but we're not meeting this weekend and as we were in the middle of a major boss fight we decided to have a "mid week session" to at least wrap the combat up before missing a normal game day.

I Started 2017 With a TPK

I was contemplating how long it had been since I had killed a player, and then I started off 2017 with a TPK that ended my 2 year running Star Wars game. Whoops?

Long story short, after 2 years and with PCs pushing on 1200+ XP, I gave them a shot at Palpatine to end the Galactic Civil War. The PCs took it. They knew the stakes, and they knew the risk was worth it. They did well. Incredibly well if I say so. And then, tragedy struck. In a weird twist, tragedy didn't strike in the form of a bad roll or a plot twist, but rather from one of the PCs deciding that he wanted to be a Jedi and that meant bringing Palpatine to face a judge/jury.

This decision gave Palpatine a chance to recover from his wounds, and with him refreshed and the party 1/2 dead...well, it was a one way show from then on.

Still, I'm proud of my players. Their characters came a long way in the game, and they came so close to winning before it went away from them. Even so, no one balked. They all took the ride for what it was, and as a GM who has faced so many tears in those situations, that was refreshing.

Now I just need to figure out where we're going from there. How has your 2017 been so far?

I Told You That So I Could Tell You This

On Saturday my housemate began the last generation of her L5R game and it was awesome. The fun part of this generation though, is that when the game started 3-4 years ago, this story was always the goal. Each player went through the events of key points in Rokugan's history through 3-4 different PCs having fun and adventures while shaping and building the world in preparation of this adventure. We're only one session in and already you can see just how much that work, those previous lives, have paid off.

Siege of Amimono no Toshi Pt. 2

Some of you asked me to report back after I wrapped the current (now previous) generation of my L5R game. As I write this it's been 2 days since the session ended, and I've had some time to think about what happened. Over all, I'm pleased. Still, I felt it only fair to answer your request and write about what happened.

Changing Gears for Fun and Profit

The L5R game one of my housemates runs every other weekend is on hiatus while she recharges her batteries and prepares for the next (modern day) generation of the game. To fill the time while we wait I volunteered to run a mini-campaign of D&D 5th edition. I've wanted to run D&D 5th for a while now, and this seemed a good opportunity. The only rule I had for my PCs? They had to play dwarves.

My reasoning for doing this? Simple. D&D is a style of game that I don't normally play. That means it focuses on muscles and skills I don't use often as a GM, and those are skills I want sharp to add to and enhance the longer term games I am running. So how did it go? Well, that's what I want to talk about today.

The Siege of Amimono no Toshi - Round Up

On Friday I ran the siege of the city my Legend of the Five Rings game has been set in for 3 generations of PCs across about 140 years of L5R timeline (starting before the second day of thunder.) By the end of the session 2 PCs were just shy of dead with 2 more in crippled or near there. The outer walls had fallen. The city was being overrun with the defenders falling back to the inner city and their second line of defense.

In short, it was a great session. But today, I want to talk about how the mechanics of the game helped it work.

Betrayal, Failure, And Snapping The Ties That Bind

I'm not sure how much advice is going to be in this post. I'm not sure how much because what happened in my last L5R game was as much a natural byproduct of running a game with strong roleplayers as anything that I did as a GM to make it happen. In a real way it was like catching lightning in a bottle. It's terrifying and awesome, but you have no idea how you did it or if you could ever replicate it. That said, a lot happened in the session. Characters now trust each other left. We ended with a general feeling of failure. A loved NPC was almost killed due to a bad decision, and in return a PC was almost executed because of misinformation. It was a good session, I want to talk about it, but don't expect this to just work at your table either. With that said, let's talk about what happened.

Whoops...A Little Too Much

A few hours ago I finished the most recent session of my Force and Destiny game. The session ended with all 5 PCs unconscious, having just lost a fight against 8 Jedi Training droids armed with training sabers. The fight was rough to say the least. Not just from a numbers perspective, but also the skill of the droids.

Aftermath of the Mass Battle

I talked on here a lot about the upcoming Mass Battle in my L5R game. It happened on Friday and, well, it was a very sordid bloody affair. 5/6 of the party ended up in at least the Out condition, the Utaku's horse was ripped out from under her and eaten by goblins, and the youngest PC (character, not player) died pushing herself to Heavily Engaged to try and save/recover said Utaku. To be blunt it was a rough session, especially on myself as the GM (my players seemed to be more ok with it), and today I want to talk about that.

How Did Friday Go?

I talked on Wednesday and Friday that Friday was going to be my first game back in the GM seat in a long time. I promised I would talk about how it went, and so that is what today's post is about. Read on for my thoughts on what went well and what I need to fix going forward.

It Was A Three Way Dance

After the post on Wednesday I figured I should follow up on what happened to end the precarious situation. Don't worry, it's a quick story but it also brings up something interesting that I need to keep in mind when I am running Shadowrun, or for any future gaming events where things are similar.

Oh My God, I'm Jealous...

A strange thing is happening right now.For the first time, that I can recall anyhow, I find myself jealous when it comes to an in game item for a character that I am done playing. The character didn't even die prematurely, the game came to its natural end and the world has moved on. It is a strange feeling, but the more I think about it the more I am sure that I don't want to see that item, that sword, in the hands of another character in that world. I figure today I'll talk about this, the whys, and maybe see if analyzing it changes my view.

For the record, by the way, jealousy is defined as "an irrational fear of losing something."

Now THAT Was Cinematic...

The word cinematic gets thrown around a lot when people are talking about systems and how their combat works. It seems almost like a holy grail that a lot of systems have been trying for. They want their games - specifically some of the most mechanically intensive part of their games - to flow and have that energy you get from watching an action sequence in a movie. The thing is though, it takes more than just mechanics to do this, it also takes a GM and players that are willing to play into it. I am ridiculously excited to say that with the right players and GM the new Star Wars system - Edge of the Empire - can pull it off in spades.

Beginning Session Mid Fight

I'm writing this earlier than I expected to, and so instead of a recap of last night's Shadowrun game it has some of my thoughts going into the Shadowrun game. Well, "going into" as defined by tonight I'll be running this thing and right now I'm waiting for work to start as I showed up early and figured I'd take care of my blog instead of something more productive.

Making A Job On The Fly

As of the time of this writing my most recent Shadowrun session has just ended within the past thirty minutes. An interesting thing happened during the game too. See, when we came into the game everything was in an odd spot with the group having just done a couple of dangerous high profile jobs and were looking to lay low for a bit. However, down time isn't very good for filling a session and so quick enough we ended up with the group looking for more work. Sadly, I didn't have anything prepared, so I dug deep into the GM tool bag and improvised. Here is how things worked out.

What A Few Cirt-Glitches Will Do To Your Session

I'm writing this shortly after the latest session of my Shadowrun game, and what a session it was. Now, the plan for the session was fairly simple. The group was in a position where they had to shake up their plans and they had very limited time to get the pieces in place. Unfortunately for the characters, and fortunately for the players and my entertainment, we had three to four critical glitches at key moments. So what happened? Well, I'd like to share this session.

Making The Unfair Fight Winnable

WOW! So, not only is this post late but I totally messed up on the scheduling for the notice that this post would be late. My humblest apologies. But wait, why is today's post late? Honestly, because I had planned to write about something I was going to do in my Shadowrun Game (which was last night) then decided I'd wait until after so I could also show how it played out. Only, after the game I was tired so I decided to sleep. Now though, now I'm ready to share it. So what happened? Well, I had a bunch of PCs - who aren't very good against magic - fight against a very old and powerful demon. It was stylish, it was challenging, and it was a lot of fun. How did it work? Well, let's begin.

Delaying Your Plans

The past two sessions of my L5R game I have gone into the session, notes in hand, prepared to launch a plot line that is going to be a large meta-arc for the game and last for sessions (and generations) to come. In both sessions I have failed to start this plot. The first session because the players found a hook to a different generation spanning plot and went after it, and last session because...well, because they didn't. Now, the first session is just your standard case of players found something else to do. However, the second session I actively stepped back and held my "GM Begins Plot" event cards close to my chest. Why? Well, that's what I want to discuss this session.

PC Death In My Campaign

My apologies for the lack of an update Thursday and Friday last week. Unsure what happened exactly, but posting to here definitely didn't. I don't like missing days without word, and while technically I said a long time ago I wasn't going to necessarily do 5 posts a week, the fact is I've been doing 5 posts a week and Friday was a day that not only I missed, but I didn't leave any word on. That said, Friday was also the day I ran my L5R game and managed to kill 2 of my players with "goblin with a rock' rolls. Today I wanted to talk about how we're handling that in my game.