[TSoY] An evil blade and emergent Simulationism

[Frank Tarcikowski]

Some time ago, I posted about a TSoY game I had started, and about how Creative Agenda was not yet emerging, how the players were still toying around with the game and the world and what they could do. In that thread, Ron predicted that it'd take at least three full sessions for a Shared Creative Agenda to emerge, if that was to happen. You can find that thread here.

On Sunday, we played the fifth session of the ongoing game. I posted some stuff about fictional content in this thread. In that session, some things fell into place, especially for two of the players, Wolf and Mandy.

Wolf is the only one of the players who has done a lot of role-playing before, and easily the most active player. Luckily, he doesn't have any bad gamer habits that I can see. In the first session, he was asking me about everything ("Can I do this? Can I have that?") He soon realized that the answer was always "yes", and started making stuff up without asking, like e.g., "My father was a captain in that company, I think you met him once".

He made a new character before session 3, a warrior/tomb raider with the Keys of Reknown and Bloodlust. He also took the Secret of the Signature Weapon and made up a magical sword that drinks blood, and wants blood. He makes a Resist check each time he draws the blade. In exchange, I ruled that it's a +2 harm weapon. Wolf loves to play the sword and how it whispers to its bearer.

Mandy is the second most active player. She still plays her Goblin, who has mainly provided comic relief and caused some havoc throughout the first three sessions. The other protagonists developed a habit of kicking the Goblin around, while Mandy was quietly gathering a lot of XP with a lot of Keys and stacking those into body weaponry and body armor. All of these Keys but one she made up herself. The last one came in session four, when the party encountered a Goblin tribe that tried to "save" Mandy's protagonist from the humans. It is:

Key of Community
You yearn for being part of a community. Gain 1 XP whenever you try to befriend members of a community or do a service to a community. Gain 3 XP whenever you place the interests of a community over your own. Buyoff: Become accepted as a full member into a community.
(I fleshed that one out a little.)

In the next session, the protagonists met a community of Zaru fugitives, guarded by the Watchers, who dwelled in the magically hidden and protected ruins of the ancient Zaru capital. We had a scene in which the goblin played with a bunch of Zaru kids and refreshed pools, and suddenly Mandy exclaimed, smiling, "Hey, that's an XP, isn't it?" Yes, it was. Later, the leader of the Zaru approached the goblin and told her that her companions had no right to kick her around.

Then there was this scene where the protagonists were being warned about the raptors hunting in the ruins, and the goblin grabbed the evil sword. (She wouldn't need a sword because her claws do more harm anyway, but still.) So she pulls out that sword and Wolf starts whispering to her, "Blood, give me blood!" She fails her resist check and attacks Wolf's protagonist, causing a deep wound, before Nicole's protagonist stops her with Enthrallment. Everyone thought it was a pretty cool scene.

Later, I described a dream of Jill's protagonist, of haunted corridors and tombs, spectre-like ghosts and an elven wizard crying for help and promising she won't regret helping him. Both Nicole and Jill were showing us the raised hair on their arms after that.

Later still, the group fought the raptors, and Nicole bought the Key of the Coward (beside the Impostor she already has), strengthening the profile of her protagonist. The goblin was the most efficient fighter and all were awed by the power of body weaponry +3 and body armor +3. However, Mandy would not take the Key of Bloodlust even though we proposed it, since that did not "fit" her protagonist. So all protagonists except Jill's by now have a "line". They have some stuff that they do, and get rewarded for through Keys, that make them distinct. Buyoff is not much of a topic, it's rather about how they are than about how they develop.

What speaks to me most is the evil sword. It's something Wolf invented and really enjoys, and the others appreciate. He does not, however, see it as a challenge to his character. There is no question of "how far will I go" or anything like that emerging. It's rather just like, "The blood runs into the lines carved into the blade and is sucked up! Coool."

Nicole is much like that with her "witty con-man who hides away his magic skills". Mandy's protagonist is the only one who has some issues, especially the community thing, but I do feel that she does not want me to challenge it. Rather, it's something she finds interesting and wants to explore, like, "What is it like for an outsider to try to become part of a community?" This is also a position with which I suspect she can strongly sympathize. At any rate, after last Sunday's session, she told me she really enjoyed herself this time.

So what I see is the group making a connection on this Shared Creative Agenda of "let's explore what it's like to be these guys, in this world, on adventurous journeys". Neat! That's something I can work with.

- Frank