[Sorcerer] In Utero - GO!

[5niper9]

We played "In Utero".
We, in this context, refers to our "Indie game group" (look for other actual play texts by "5niper9" for more infos) plus another player who had played rpgs for one and a half years now and had merely a brush with indie games (one game of Dogs plus a session of Capes with three people who had never roleplayed before.)

It was a nice game that lasted around 3 hours. Almost everything went smoothly except for me forgetting completely about the snapshot rules.

When I mix up some of the presented character names, it is because Edwin decided to Gm for us in the very near future and I borrowed him my books. (Yay, play-time for me!)

Preparation:<
Who played whom?<
How it turned out:<
Where occured problems?<
Things I noticed:

• The system is hard on the players.

In every session we played they had lots of problems to make the rituals work. This is nice because to make it more likely to work they would have to invest more time or other important things into it and the whole process would evolve to a completely player driven bunch of scenes.

<

[Ron Edwards]

[5niper9]

Hi Ron,
sorry for the delay. We searched for (and found) a flat in Goettingen.

This looks great. The two structural mistakes (Humanity checks for rituals, snapshot) are completely normal when most of the people involved are new to the game. The snapshot one is comparatively trivial and at least you didn't forget all the Humanity checks. You will find yourself correcting them without any stress over time.

I think so. I just wanted to mention it.

Did anyone feel sorry for any of the demons?

Not the least.
David decided that Robert aimed for a stable relationship with Steph, which changes as the demons were banished.
Edwin played "Lucien" like wanted to remain in a stable relationship with "Jen", but more in the abusive she-has-power-and-I-don't way.
And Anna played Jennifer ignorant of the fact that it was a demon inside her.

How did you like playing the demons? Did you play them as total monsters?

Especcially "Jen" was no fun for me. In the beginning when Steph was there I had to play the demon baby, "Jen" and Steph. Even more so when Stephanie and "Jen" were on oppossed sides of a discussion. It looks stupid and it is quite exhausting to talk with your self int his way. Also it was a very strange way (compared to other rsp experiences) to have the player of Lucien ask for movement or single sentences of the demon. So I decided quickly that he should just talk and describe what his demon would do.

I think the demons were seen as antagonists because of the failure of the ritual 10 years ago. "This went wrong, so everything related to that must be wrong.", but I can only speculate.

I suppose I really should call the printer and schedule a re-printing of Sex & Sorcery.