[DitV] Sister Deborah's Initiation

[Nev the Deranged]

 Wow. So, totally by accident, I ended up running Shannon through chargen for DitV tonight.

A bit of background: I've been trying to convert Shannon to indie games since I've known her. She's a d20/WoD player who was constantly complaining about her games not doing what she wanted. I kept saying "Here, this game does that. Try it!" and she was always reticent. I gave her Forge articles to read and although she appreciated some of it, she was still reticent. I finally gave up and looked for other people to play.

Then I mentioned Dogs. She actually expressed interest, which I though was mostly due to her background as a former elder in the LDS church, (of which she is no longer a member), and I assumed it was just passing. But tonight, I was sitting there with the book, and she actually sat down and insisted we play. After I got over my flabbergastity and made sure she didn't just want to play Kill Mormons for Satan (or at least not just that), we were off.

So. We started off chatting about the background, the Faith, the setting. She expressed a desire to have the supernatural stuff dialed down to almost zero, but as she traited up her character it became somewhat more ambiguous, as you'll see. It may still be possible to play a near-zero supernatural game, but I think it would actually be a scarier game than one with demons running rampant.

She chose Complicated Community, and after some deliberation and further chatting about background, this is what she started with:


Sister Deborah               Acuity: 4d6     Body: 5d6     Heart: 2d6     Will: 4d6

Traits:
"I can get whipped with a switch and not cry", 2d6
"I had to read Scripture four hours every day", 1d8
"When I was five, I had a demon cast out of me", 1d8
"I sang in the church choir", 1d6
"I can drop a varmint at 50 paces", 1d6
"I'm devout", 1d6
"I'm a Dog", 1d6

Relationships:
"My 10 years older sister who runned off", 2d4
"I was in love with cousin Ezra", 1d8
"Brother Zekial cast the demon out of me", 1d8
Free dice: 2d4, 2d6, 2d10

Belongings:
Coat, 2d6
Horse, 1d6
Gun, 1d6 + 1d4
Book of Life, 1d6
Consecrated Earth, 1d6
Book of Psalms (Hymnal), 1d6
Mother's Silver Locket, 1d6
Boots, 1d6
Simple Dress, 1d6
Big Ass Knife, 1d8
Hat, 1d6
(*note that I didn't think it was really necessary to list nonspecial d6 items, but there was no reason not to, either, so I didn't worry about it)


Sister Deborah's older sister was a bit of a wild child. She ran off when Deborah was young, (maybe to the Mountain People, who knows?). As a result, Sister Deborah's parents vowed that by the King, she would be raised obedient in the Faith. So they spared not the rod, nor the sermon. Sister Deborah's upbringing was regimented, strict, and often painful. When her mother died, she set out for Bridal Falls to continue her service to the King of Life.

After a bit of hemming and hawing (we were both pretty burned out, it was around 11pm already), Shannon chose for her Initiation conflict: "I hope I learn the value of compassion.", which sounded just dandy to me. We pondered a bit more to come up with a suitable scene, and sort of stumbled on one by sheer mumbled brainstorming. I didn't keep track of the actual dice results, sorry.

The scene: a pasture, over which Brother Job has been charged to watch the livestock. Brother Job, however, is asleep lying on the beam between two fenceposts. A scraggly but sharp eyed wolf has been eyeing the flock from the ridgeline for a while, and has determined that now would be the time to make the snatch. Just as it's selecting the juiciest flank to tear into, Sister Deborah, who just happened by, raises her rifle and plugs it square in the eyes. (I didn't roll anything for this, because it's not actually related to the stakes).

She raises: "Brother Job! It seems you've been careless in your duties!"

Brother Job, who has just woken rather suddenly (gunshots will do that, eh?), and has fallen off the fence flat on his face, comes up with a bloody nose, sees the wolf at the edge of the pasture, and quickly ascertains the situation- he's flat guilty. He rolls with it, though, sniffling apologetically. "I'm awful sorry, Sister. I snif didn't mean it. I was up so late reading from the Book of Life last night snif I just couldn't stay awake."

Sister Deborah is not having it. "That's no excuse! I read from the Book of Life for four hours every day since I was five, and you don't see me sleeping on a fence. Now quit blubbering like a girl!" (zing! With the strict adherence to gender roles in the Faith, I figured that had to leave a mark).

Job sobers up, drying his eyes on the back of his sleeve. He looks down and moans anew. "Aw, shucks and tarnation!  Look, I've done and got blood all over my coat! And I just got it yesterday!" Brother Job is devastated. His coat is obviously a labor of love, the patterns intricate and varied and clearly the work of a multitude of hands. And there's a large, dark stain right down the front, impossible to hide.

Sister Deborah looks on, thin lipped, and nods. "Your coat bears the mark of your sin, Brother Job."

"I failed to learn the value of compassion", 1d6

Sister Deborah looks down at her own coat, every stitch perfect and clean. The vertical white stripes over navy blue, severe and unrelieved by color save for the bright red Tree of Life, bold and unmistakeable on the back, and the repeated symbol stitched into the hems and cuffs. Made not by the hands of a loving family, but by the elders of the temple of her home town, every thread imbued with the severity of strict adherence they had demanded of her from her earliest memories. As Brother Job tries in vain to use a handful of grass to scrub the stain from his own beautiful coat, she turns away, lip curling.

"My coat is my prison", 1d4

Whew.

I gotta tell ya, I've heard it before but I wouldn't have believed it without seeing it. Even when the players are at half-mast, the system delivers. I mean, we sucked, and things still came out cooler than we could have hoped. We decided to grab some food and go play Xbox for a while, but Shannon kept talking about how cool Sister Deborah is. I was like "yeah, she so broken". She misunderstood me until I said "No, not mechanically, I mean as a person." And then she was like "oh, yeah, definitely."  And then I'm like "She's gonna set some town on fire."  And we're both grinning like monkeys.

Shannon wants to get other people together to play now. She was on the phone actually telling her friends about the game. I'm stunned, this is the same girl who just a few months ago was telling me she hates games with "descriptors" and who, when I was describing some game or other actually asked (I kid you not) "But where's the Strength stat?"

All the time I spent trying to convert her may not have been wasted after all, eh? Heh. I can't take credit. It's all on Vincent.  =P~

[droog]

Hooray! And hooray for Vincent too.

[Jason Morningstar]

"My coat is my prison 1D4"

That's so awesomely awesome - give her a high-five for me.  I totally want to steal that trait. 

[Meguey]

Whoa. Sister Deborah is a Dog after my own heart - looking forward to more from her!