[Bliss Stage] Jude gets better, plus alien tentacles!

[GreatWolf]

i] Bliss Stage makes me think of this.

Broadcast Archive: 
 

• Saved through childbearing
• Love and violence in Peoria

Last week sometime, my nine year-old daughter comes up to me and says that she has drawn up pictures of the entire family as Bliss Stage<Bliss Stage<Koosh balls.  So suit up, strap in, and prepare for launch!


<Anchor Training<marriage ceremony<Mission Brief<Anchor Training<Blowing off Steam<On the Offensive

Soon thereafter, Jared summoned Marcus and Jude.  He had a major strike for them to accomplish.  He needed them to head north into enemy territory, locate the alien base, and plant another sensor package right in the base itself.  One of them would need to distract the aliens so that the other one could enter the base secretly.

Mission Brief<On the Offensive<Weddings and Babies<this.[/i]

Broadcast Archive: 
 

• Saved through childbearing
• Love and violence in Peoria

Last week sometime, my nine year-old daughter comes up to me and says that she has drawn up pictures of the entire family as Bliss Stage<Bliss Stage<Koosh balls.  So suit up, strap in, and prepare for launch!


<Anchor Training<marriage ceremony<Mission Brief<Anchor Training<Blowing off Steam<On the Offensive

Soon thereafter, Jared summoned Marcus and Jude.  He had a major strike for them to accomplish.  He needed them to head north into enemy territory, locate the alien base, and plant another sensor package right in the base itself.  One of them would need to distract the aliens so that the other one could enter the base secretly.

Mission Brief<On the Offensive<Weddings and Babies

[GreatWolf]

b]Alien Fury<Mission Brief< Alien Fury <Wedding bells<<Hospital Raid<Mission Brief<Hospital Raid<said<At the end of the nightMission Brief< Alien Fury <Wedding bells<<Hospital Raid<Mission Brief<Hospital Raid<said<At the end of the night

[Marhault]

Seth,

I wasn't going to buy Bliss Stage.  Maybe eventually, but certainly not right away.  Mecha don't get me going like they do with some people.  These APs have changed that.

Just so's you know.

[GreatWolf]

Seth,

I wasn't going to buy Bliss Stage.  Maybe eventually, but certainly not right away.  Mecha don't get me going like they do with some people.  These APs have changed that.

Just so's you know.

Another notch!

Seriously, let me finish describing the conversation with Arianna.  She thought that the idea of going to sleep and fighting aliens was pretty cool.  So I said to her, "Bliss Stage isn't about fighting aliens.  That's just what makes the story move forward."  Or something like that.  I was more eloquent then.

Bliss Stage isn't a series of missions interspersed with interludes.  It's a series of interludes interspersed with missions.

More on this later, plus post-game reflections.

[GreatWolf]

b]Reflections on the game<Bliss Stage<Bliss Stage<Steal Away Jordan.  So, Ben, stay tuned.  You may have an unusual selling point for Bliss Stage<Rules questions

We did end up with some rules questions.

--Does a denouement caused from battle damage count as a privileged interlude?

--If you successfully create a new anchor, does the new anchor get an anchor ability?  If so, who decides?

--During an anchor training mission, can the trainee anchor?  Or do you actually need to have an experienced anchor there, plus the trainee?


ClosingBliss Stage<Bliss Stage<Steal Away Jordan.  So, Ben, stay tuned.  You may have an unusual selling point for Bliss Stage<Rules questions

We did end up with some rules questions.

--Does a denouement caused from battle damage count as a privileged interlude?

--If you successfully create a new anchor, does the new anchor get an anchor ability?  If so, who decides?

--During an anchor training mission, can the trainee anchor?  Or do you actually need to have an experienced anchor there, plus the trainee?


Closing

[Gabrielle]

You may have an unusual selling point for Bliss Stage<

As if! I can usually roll dice just fine. They don't always do what I tell them to, but on average polyhedrons and I get along just fine. For some reason Bliss Stage makes the dice hate me. It feels like I roll more (-)  than physically possible. If I have three dice I will four (-). So maybe the selling point should be "Reverses your usual dice skills". I can just see the advertising. "Do you normally roll well? Have you ever wondered what it would be like to roll suckier than statistically possible? Try Bliss Stage."

[Per Fischer]

Thanks for this AP,following it intensely, as we start a BS game tomorrow night after playing the intro scenario.

	Logged

Per
--------
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

[GreatWolf]

Hi, Per!  I listened to your AP recording.  Fun!  The cascading doom at the end of Final Act is an interesting feature and I'm wondering if it's just that scenario, or if it's part of the Bliss Stage end game.

Hmm.  Questions.  That makes sense to me.  Gabrielle is watching this thread, so I'll ask her.  Does that help at all?

I hope that your game goes well.  One thing that I'll note:  do expect to spend an entire session on game prep.  I'm mentioning this because I recall a comment from your AP report about Bliss Stage being quick to set up when playing Final Act.  So, FYI and all that.

[Per Fischer]

I hope that your game goes well.  One thing that I'll note:  do expect to spend an entire session on game prep.  I'm mentioning this because I recall a comment from your AP report about Bliss Stage being quick to set up when playing Final Act.  So, FYI and all that.

Thanks, Seth. I did have in mind spending an evening on game prep plus socialising a bit, as I only know the other players from a short session of play.

Per

[Gabrielle]

Hmm.  Questions.  That makes sense to me.  Gabrielle is watching this thread, so I'll ask her.  Does that help at all?

It helps a bit, but I don't think it really touches the hang-up I'm having. I am finding Bliss Stage to be a deeply immersive game. I actually sometimes have two very different thoughts come to mind. One of the thoughts is mine and the other is the characters. It's an odd feeling. But suddenly, when I'm the Anchor, I either have to pull out of the character and, in essence, run GM for the Pilot or I have to stay very much in character and figure out what's going on in the Dreamworld at the same time. I would prefer to do the second and I think we've come close to Anchoring this way in our second session, but for our third and fourth either Crystal or I was brain-fried going into the session. And it is very difficult to juggle multiple trains of thought when one is brain-fried.

I think that's more the problem. I could either be in character or I could GM the mission, but not both at the same time. So I chose be in character and the Anchor and Pilot end up just staring at each other across the table.

[Ben Lehman]

--Does a denouement caused from battle damage count as a privileged interlude?

A denouemont is a privileged action, seperate from the privileged action that a pilot receives for going on a mission. It's quite possible to stack up two or more privileged actions.

--If you successfully create a new anchor, does the new anchor get an anchor ability?  If so, who decides?

Like with all anchor abilities, the GM decides.

--During an anchor training mission, can the trainee anchor?  Or do you actually need to have an experienced anchor there, plus the trainee?

My thought here is that the trainee does the anchoring. That's how we handled it in our play. You could handle it in the other way without trouble, though. It depends a lot on your group's established setting and color.

As for the "anchor out of character" thing, here's some approaches that I've seen used:

1) The anchor, in character, has a fair control over the dream. So a nice anchor will show the pilot a nicer, more relaxed dreamworld. And an aggressive anchor will show a more militaristic dreamworld. One of my favorite bits of play to watch was when my friend Kate was playing an anchor for a mission that had gone off the rails, and took about 5 minutes to just create a nice vision of an empty clearing, surrounded by fruit trees, with a burbling brook, etc and waiting until the pilot had calmed down to go out on the mission. This really displayed the anchor's personality, I think.

2) Another approach is to play the anchor passively -- just describing what the anchor is perceiving -- and assume that the anchor has some sort of "bird's eye view" of the dream world. This results in some wonderful moments as well "Oh my God get down!" lets the pilot know the panic without letting the pilot know what to see, which can be great for ratcheting up the tension.

Looking forward to your climax.

yrs--
--Ben