Dungeon World - New Planes

Yesterday I played in the second part of a "Dungeon World" campaign run by Michael Bay.This was only my second time playing the game itself and I'm more in tune with the rules now, along with the rest of the group.

The storyline picked up roughly where we left off last time, though at the start of the session not all players were present. This actually set things up beautifully and freed the smaller group to pursue another direction.Two of the players did join the session later on with almost spooky timing in terms of the storyline and narrative.

What had started as a standard dungeon crawl last time progressed through woodland ceremonies, abandoned altars, dissolving planes of existence,the "world tree" and finally an old ruined city in the desert.This was all in a single five hour session, and all the settings really added to the story and sense of adventure.

This being the second session, we were all more familiar with the rules, our characters and the relationships between us.This game gives experience rewards for playing true to bonds that you've made with other characters in the creation session,and also your alignment.This is a really nice way to give you a personal character "compass" for how to handle situations. In my case,as a cleric, I made several decisions in the game that put the group,and world,at risk, almost costing my life at the end. This was all part of staying true to the cleric's faith, and my last action was to turn away hordes of undead skeletons...having let the genie out of the bottle I saved the group.

The game finished with a character encounter that was unexpected yet managed to tie everything together with the core story.This was the first game I've played in a long time where we were so engaged in the game that we'd ran over time without realizing it...credit to Michael's storytelling and a great group who managed to really keep the game flowing. I've absolutely no idea what twists and turns the next one will take, but this was a truly excellent gaming session. If you like "Apocalypse World" and classic fantasy, I highly recommend checking this one out.

Call of Cthulhu - "The Sanatorium"

One of the first "Call of Cthulhu" scenarios I ran was "The Sanatorium"  from the compilation book "Mansions of Madness". In it's own way, it was the most important scenario I've run in terms of how it enhanced my GM style and built my confidence.

The scenario is about a private sanatorium on a small island off the coast of Massachusetts.The resident doctor is experimenting with hypnosis, still highly controversial in the 1920's setting.He invites a player character out so he can share his findings.Of course, it's not so straightforward.

One of the patients has been communicating with a creature from space while in deep hypnosis. The creature comes to the island and needs energy (in the form of human sacrifices) to free itself and return home. It can also possess the minds of humans. When the game starts, a male nurse has been possessed and has already started the sacrifices. The first victims are the hospital staff, and it's real fun when the players realize that the people welcoming them into the hospital are the patients!

One of the great things about this scenario is that all the characters encountered by the players at this point are patients, and hopelessly insane. The game becomes a challenge in that the players don't know who to trust, what information is real or imagined, all while being stalked by the crazed nurse. The real villain of the piece is so truly alien that they really won't figure it all out.

For me as a GM, this presented numerous challenges. The first was playing ten support characters.I had to keep track of them all and play them convincingly. All of the characters had important histories so it was a real test to make them come across as distinct people and interact with the players. The second challenge was the sheer size of the group...I had nine players! I'd never had a group that size before. The third challenge was the that group broke into three smaller parties, each exploring different parts of the ideal. So in all, a lot of moving parts where involved. That being said, the setting is a sandbox with borders....the players can't get off the island.

The important lesson that I learned was that I found it easier to run the game with multiple groups, timelines and threads. That was a surprise for me and it's certainly not the preference of every GM. I enjoyed that approach so much that I now encourage my Cthulhu groups to split up in most sessions, something that worked to great effect in the "Delta Green" game especially. It's a great scenario, especially if you enjoy confusing your players!

Delta Green Pt 1 - "Convergence"

Yesterday was the first session of "Delta Green" that I've ran.It's a "Call of Cthulhu" spin-off set in the 1990's and has the characters as agents in a pan-Government conspiracy. The game was created to tackle three common issues that players and GMs regularly run into when running "Cthulhu".

The first is having a reason for involving the characters in the scenario initially.The second is for having an reason for those same characters to continue investigating dangerous paranormal cases. The third is how to make it easy to introduce new player characters into an ongoing campaign given the high character turnover often associated with "Cthulhu" games.Making the players part of an organization gives answers to all three.

I chose one of the original published scenarios,"Convergence", as it gave a solid and potentially lethal taste of the new setting.It had an old Mythos baddie,Greys, Men In Black, alien viruses,UFOs,cattle mutilation and body alteration.The players in the group were all experienced in "CoC" and role-playing in general so I didn't see the need to ease them into things.

The player characters were a CIA Agent, FBI Agent, former FBI Psychologist,CDC Scientist,DEA Scientist and an Author specializing in the paranormal.Without going into plot details (I don't want to spoil it,being a published scenario), the group split up in their investigation,with most of the group heading to a small town in Tennessee to track the mystery behind a murder case. Two other characters went to a compound and did scientific research that would have huge impact on the outcome of the game.Again, without giving too much away,this resulted in helicopters being sent into the town overnight,to spray the town with several chemical agents to determine if a virus was present.

Of course, there were plenty of plot twists and the conspiratorial nature of "Delta Green" had characters sending mixed messages and sabotaging each other...paranoia levels were high. One character died at the hands of another, and some characters fled the country when they understood the extent of the threat they were dealing with.

All in all, it was a great session. It was a complex, dangerous scenario that flowed smoothly with great role-playing from the great.I wouldn't recommend this setting for GMs who don't have "Call of Cthulhu" experience, but it's a fantastic alternative setting to try...highly recommended!

Call of Cthulhu - "The Condemned"

This week I'm reminiscing about my favorite "Call of Cthulhu" scenario, "The Condemned". It's been published several times, I found it in the supplement "H.P. Lovecraft's Arkham".

"The Condemned" was the fourth published scenario that I chose to run.The first three were "Edge Of Darkness","The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse" and "The Sanatorium".It was the most complex in terms of plot and also the first that ran across two sessions.

What makes the story special is the villain,"Sermon Bishop". Bishop is a wizard from 17th Century New England, a truly foul character who makes a deal with "The Treader of Dust".The deal grants him immortality in exchange for his soul and the cost of a deformed neck.Bishop is captured and imprisoned by seven locals who entombed him in the support structure of a stone bridge.Fast forward two hundred years and a lightning strike to the bridge releases him.He stumbles upon two college students camping by the river and uses magic to perform a body swap with one of them.He kills the other student and buries him with his own seventy year old body,which is now "home" to the mind of the other student.

The players enter the story having been asked to track down the missing student as his colleague, now possessed by Bishop, has wandered into town claiming amnesia.The players interview the student and notice he has an odd accent (it's Bishops).There is another thread to the story of course.Now that Bishop is free,he scours the local libraries to trace the descendants of those who had imprisoned him centuries earlier.Once his list of the seven is compiled,he goes on a rampage killing each in different ways.

I finished the first session by hitting the players from three angles.First,they find the body of the student and also Bishops body.Interviewing "Bishop", they figure out the body swap.Second, the possessed student breaks out of hospital and starts the revenge killings.Third,they put the pieces together and get hold of his hitlist of victims.To add a bit of urgency, I handed over the list which I'd altered from the one in the published scenario...I replaced two of the victims names with two of the player characters! A great way to wrap up a session with the players knowing that the villain is coming after them.

The second session was much more aggressively played with the players decided to take the fight to Bishop. This resulted in an underground showdown in which "The Treader of Dust" himself is summoned.One of the players took the chance to do a deal himself with the Treader,thus cancelling Bishops deal! Bishop was swiftly dealt with,and we had the unusual situation going forward of a character being immortal.There is much more to the game that I've skimmed,but it's a special scenario that has all the elements you'd hope to see in a "Cthulhu" game...a deadly villain,complex mystery and a lethal old book.I highly recommend it.