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A few preliminary comments--I started this yesterday, and my computer froze while I was trying to find my notes, so I just gave up and went to bed. I'm trying again tonight. This is a storymap created last Saturday night by my "in-house" playtest group--that is, my family, primarily.

[*]Why am I posting this? Part of it is to get feedback on it. Part of it is to see whether others are interested in playing it, and what results they get from their story. Part of it is because Seth encouraged me to do so, as storymap generation is a very unusual aspect of the game and so may present particular difficulties to some players.[*]The map was devised primarily by me (old guy who doesn't remember how old he is, gamer for a quarter century), my second son Kyler (17, the one with the best verbal creativity), and my third son Tristan (15, the one with the graphics art talents), with help from fourth son Evan (13), eldest Ryan (19), and houseguest Kellie (15, female). All have been gaming since second grade but Kellie--I don't know when she started, but her father was an avid gamer, so she, too, started young. My youngest, Adam (11, and has been creating game-like stories before he could talk clearly enough for us to understand him) was very upset that he was not part of this phase, but he fell asleep early and I couldn't wake him; he will participate in play. My wife may also play, depending on whether we do this on a night when she is home.[*]I'm going to present the map itself in this post, and then come back in a second post with my recollections of how we created it. I wasn't going to include that part, but Seth suggested it might help others figure out how to do the same.[*]To facilitate understanding, character information will be offset at the points at which the characters are introduced to the story.[/list:u]

The Storymap

There is a sense in which our story begins far away from here, in the distant south, when a certain digger paladin named Doug saw a vision in which a great unicorn led an army of digger paladins against an evil dragon, and left his home to join that army.

Quote from: Regarding Doug, weDoug has a gibbous virtue and a gibbous force, half determination, and new insight.  He is gibbous trusting, full courageous, crescent socially inept, full purposeful, and gibbous self-controlled.

Although this was certainly a noble purpose, it is perhaps unfortunate that as he approached the southernmost of the villages of men in the wilderness, the first person he met was Lucifer.  No one knows that Lucifer is a dragon cultist, a man hungry for power and quite willing to deceive and manipulate others to get it.

Quote from: Concerning Lucifer weLucifer has a new virtue and a new force, full insight and crescent determination.  He is full shrewd and crescent cowardly, and has three points of corruption.

Lucifer took advantage of Doug's trusting nature and offered to help him understand who the true villains were.  Doug believed his tales.

Those tales primarily focused on a good-hearted blessed girl named Teresa, who has been genuinely trying to help people with her gifts.  Not so long ago, Teresa passed through this village, and as she helped the villagers she also weakened Lucifer's influence over them.  He hates her for this, and has been seeking a way to destroy her; but although she has sometimes made mistakes, people have come to love and trust her for her kindness as she wanders the wilderness from village to village making lives better.  Lucifer knows that if he took action against her directly, or sent someone to do so, it would only weaken that influence further.  But if he could get this foreigner to destroy her, perhaps it could not be traced back to him.  He has painted Teresa as a dangerous and evil freak and a friend of another dangerous and evil freak, so horrifying the confused paladin that he immediately promised to put a stop to their evil.

Teresa is unaware that Lucifer hates her; she has moved on to other people in other villages, not knowing that Doug is now hunting her.

Quote from: When we detailed Teresa, weTeresa has gibbous virtue and gibbous determination, crescent force and crescent insight.  She has a new short temper, full good hearted, full loyal (to her friend), gibbous caring, and crescent feeling of rejected.  This latter has improved through the gratitude of those she has helped.

Teresa travels with her friend Cory, a misbegotten who was born blind with a unicorn-like horn protruding from his forehead.  Cory's other senses are strong, particularly his hearing.  He is sympathetic in both senses of the word:  people pity him, but they also find that he understands their problems and has real concern for them.  As a result, Cory has managed to move with Teresa and find help.

Quote from: About Cory, weCory has full virtue and full insight, new force and crescent determination.  He has full sympathetic, crescent dependent (as a trait:  he feels his dependency, in addition to it being a fact), crescent lack of confidence (which leads him to be quiet), and gibbous brave.

Lucifer has sent his favorite thug, Bruce, with Doug, to help find and identify Teresa.  Bruce likes to beat people up, but only does it if he's paid.  He and Doug have begun the hunt for Teresa and Cory.

Quote from: In detailing Bruce, weBruce is a common thug of crescent virtue, with full force, crescent determination, and new insight.  He is self-centered at crescent, reckless at new, sadistic at crescent, and true to his word at full, with one point of corruption.

Teresa is not Lucifer's only enemy, certainly.  One of the other villagers, Lumina, has never trusted him, and the two are open enemies.  Lumina is Chosen, given a prophetic gift by a unicorn with the words, "You are to be a light in dark places."  She tries to help people do good, which is what she understands that to mean.  She does not know that she could shine a light from herself which would be dazzling and possibly even blinding, should she choose to do so.

Quote from: Finally, of Lumina, weLumina is full virtue, with gibbous determination, crescent force, and crescent insight.  She is gibbous brave, full principled, and crescent judgmental, with one point of inspiration and one of corruption.

As our story opens, Lumina has just learned from the other villagers that Lucifer sent Bruce to find Teresa.  She knows that can't be good.  She does not know about Doug, who is traveling with Bruce.

--M. J. Young

How did we get to this?

I stated above that I would try to recreate what we did; here goes.

We started with the fact that Tristan wanted a digger paladin. We noted it first.

Kyler thought the paladin ought to be pursuing one of the blessed; but he wanted the blessed to be someone good, whom the paladin ought not destroy, and I suggested that he (became she later) had a genuinely good heart, was a nice guy, and has been helping people with his gifts, and the digger paladin was now hunting him.

Looking for a way to reconcile this apparent enmity between the good paladin and the good blessed character, I suggested that the digger paladin came north and was tricked by a dragon cultist into believing the cultist one of the good guys. This suggested that the cultist would try to get the digger paladin to destroy one of the cultist's enemies. That enemy would be the blessed character.

The fact that the digger was hunting him suggested we had to be in the wilderness. The Citadel really wasn't large enough for there to be any delay in the hunt, and the other locations would not accommodate the presence of a good and helpful blessed. That's what placed our meeting in a southern village, which fit well with the idea that the cultist was the first person the paladin met.

Kyler also suggested both that we should include a misbegotten and that we should include a friend for the blessed character. Since these ideas both came in at once, they fit together--particularly as both would be outcasts normally. In looking for deformities, someone suggested a horn, which I immediately latched onto, as I thought it would be an interesting possibility if the friend of the hunted blessed character had so significant a trait in common with the unicorn of the digger's dream. Kyler then suggested that the misbegotten was born blind, without irises or pupils in the eyes. I asked how such a child could have survived, and his thoughts were that the character has always been dependent on others, but has very strong hearing and other senses. We also decided at that point that this character was also good, and sympathetic in both senses of the word (my idea), so that people would first pity the character and then find compassionate understanding from him.

That gave us four characters, but I was interested in having someone Chosen in the mix. We decided that the chosen character would be an enemy of the cultist, but not know he was a cultist--just didn't like him or trust him. Kyler wanted the gift to be that he could shine forth in a blinding light, because he saw the potential in that this would not hurt the blind character in any way; I was uncomfortable with that idea, because I couldn't think of any way that the gift might have been given in some past situation (I think of the gifts as given at a moment of need, and then used thereafter at need). Kyler suggested that the unicorns knew it would be needed, and so gave it in anticipation of what would happen. I suggested from that that it was given in that cryptic prophetic formula, and that the character had interpreted it to mean helping people be good, which we changed to helping them do good along the way.

We now had five characters, but we might have seven (or even eight) people at the table when we play (anyway, that's the hope, but probably someone will miss the game). We also realized we had only one villain, even if the paladin was mistakenly on his side, so we needed another. A thug who worked for the cultist seemed a viable option, someone strong and dumb who likes beating up people.

Fleshing out the characters was something of a round robin affair. We each wound up with two character papers in front of us (actually, we started the papers while there were only five characters, and added the sixth during the naming part). We named Doug first--Evan suggested the name after we kicked around several others (Digger, Alladin the Paladin, Large Dark (sorry, that's from an Alan Sherman song we sing, the Large Dark Aardvark Song), a few others). I suggested Lucifer for the villain and Teresa, after Mother Theresa, for the blessed character, because I thought they'd be memorable. For the misbegotten, I suggested Cory because of the relation to horn, and Tristan pointed out that this also fit with Unicorn. Lumina was the only name we even considered for the chosen. On the Thug, we started with Brute and Brutus, but it reminded us too much of Popeye. It morphed to Bruts and then Bruce. There were some other names popped in places, but they more or less fizzled immediately. We started the virtues before we finished the names, but had all the names and virtues before we started the attributes. We kept naming traits for characters, but setting them aside by jotting them on the story map rather than the character papers until we got the attributes together. It was during the naming that Kyler said the Blessed should be a girl, and then that the misbegotten should be a boy. We made the chosen a girl to even the numbers a bit after we had the other five identified by gender, although I think I'd envisioned her a girl before that.

Doug, who was in my hands, had strong force and determination as befits his calling, but low insight because he was totally taken in by the cultist. Lucifer, in Tristan's pile, we quickly agreed was all scheming insight, with a sliver of determination. I think at times we would have liked enough points to give someone one full attribute and one half attribute or one full and two crescent, but we stayed within the parameters. It made sense for Lucifer to have no force. Neither Doug nor Teresa were purely good, we thought, but Lucifer was completely evil. Kyler had Teresa, and decided that she did not have much insight or strength, so we put both of those at crescent and gave her gibbous determination. I think it was Kyler's idea that Cory have full virtue and full insight. I don't know that I'd have done either of those without his input, but Cory was in his hands so we sort of deferred to him on that. We agreed that the extra point should be crescent determination. We also agreed that Bruce was not all bad, but he was all muscle including in his head, which gave us his scores. I immediately said Lumina should be full virtue because she was chosen, but we were less certain where her strengths were. They landed in gibbous determination after much discussion, with crescent in the other two.

We spent a lot of time coming up with traits, and looked up the book list about a third of the way through but still tried to come up with our own. We started with those we'd already noted about the characters during the other phases--Doug was trusting, Lucifer shrewd, Teresa good-hearted, and Cory dependent. Kyler added short-tempered to Teresa so quickly it wound up her first trait; he wanted her to have a weakness in that area that would connect to why she didn't have full virtue. Doug was the most difficult, in part because we didn't want to give him any I/C points. Lucifer may have been easiest, although when Kyler suggested he was Cowardly, it took probably a full minute for Tristan to decide whether or not that was how he saw the character. I sort of wanted Lucifer to have the corruption points to spend on taking over resolution at times. We rejected Lecherous for Bruce partly because we expect to have an eleven year old in the game, but more because I couldn't see an effective way for it to become part of play. I could almost imagine someone invoking lechery against him with "a sexy barmaid comes through the room and distracts him", but that didn't seem like one character using it against another. Kyler suggested that since there were two girls on the good guys side, this might be a factor, but I objected that Bruce didn't have a subtle bone in his body. If it were Lucifer (for whom the trait didn't fit), you could invoke lechery against him as preventing him from making enemies of women he wanted to seduce, but with Bruce it wouldn't work that way--he wouldn't be bright enough not to make enemies of them. The biggest sticking point, I think, was trying to find a good quality for Bruce; it wasn't the last one (we had started with Doug, and set him aside with three traits but didn't want to put the rest into I/C and couldn't think of two more just then), but it was the one on which we spent the most time. "True to his Word" came out of knocking around reliable and dependable and loyal and obedient (everyone contributed on this), trying to get exactly what we wanted--the idea of self-centered had several times been described as "I'm not going out to do that; it's raining, and I'm not going anywhere until it stops", which didn't sound like any of those, but we decided he was the sort of person who would do what he said once he'd said it.

So that's basically how we got what we got.

I'd be glad to entertain questions, if anyone has any.

--M. J. Young

The big question, of course, is who is going to play which character. It seems to be working out fairly well, as most of the potential players are interested in two characters, so it will be a matter of fitting everyone together.

Kyler would like to play either Teresa or Cory; we'll probably let him have Teresa, as we think he could do it extremely well.

For Adam, Doug and Cory are the choices that interest him. There's some thought that he shouldn't play Doug, because it was feared that he would immediately switch sides to the good side rather than play it through; on the other hand, Adam is the one who suggested a possible outcome in which Lucifer repents and Doug, confused and betrayed, attacks him. Adam's position is that it's allowed for the really bad villain to change sides, but that the number two villain (in this case Bruce) can't.

Ryan has expressed an interest in playing Lucifer, but he's flexible. He's the strategist of the group, so having him in the villain role would be particularly interesting.

Tristan has not expressed a choice yet, but people have suggested Bruce for him.

There's also talk about how it might resolve; but we'll see how that develops.

--M. J. Young

I'm curious about something.  Lucifer was given a Full Moon in his Shrewd Trait.  Why Full and not New?  From where I sit, it seems that his being shrewd is quite evil.  Or am I misunderstanding something about the character?

I also love the symbolism of Cory's horn.  Great stuff.

Looking forward to hearing more.

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

Quote from: GreatWolfI'm curious about something.  Lucifer was given a Full Moon in his Shrewd Trait.  Why Full and not New?  From where I sit, it seems that his being shrewd is quite evil.  Or am I misunderstanding something about the character?

Maybe we're misunderstanding something about the concepts of the traits.

It seems from our perspective that a gibbous or full trait is a character strength, and a crescent or new trait is a character weakness. I see characters using "positive" traits to their advantage and "negative" traits to someone's disadvantage.

Looked at another way, "Shrewd" would be a trait particularly akin to Lucifer's high Insight. In the same way that he would use his insight to win a conflict, he would use his shrewdness to win a conflict. Thus I see positive traits as things that would be activated in favor of the character, and negative traits as things that would be activated against him.

I can see a situation in which Lucifer would say that he was going to use his insight, but Teresa would say that she was going to activate his cowardice against him; I can't see a situation in which another character would activate his shrewdness against him. Thus I perceive it as a positive trait, even though Lucifer uses it for his nefarious purposes.

Again, perceived another way, if Lumina were shrewd, that would be a positive trait, indicating that she knows how to manipulate people for the better. The trait itself is positive or negative in how it strengthens or weakens the character in general, not the use to which it is put.

The difficult one, of course, is that Doug is gibbous trusting. That has been used against him. Yet I still see it as a strength/virtue (although at this instant I'm not sure I can express exactly why--something to do with an ability to rely on the word of others).

Have I missed something?

--M. J. Young

Remember that Traits are not as much a matter of "strength/weakness" or "positive/negative".  Rather, they are "Good/Evil".  Traits must therefore be morally aligned.  If Lucifer's shrewdness is merely a strength of the character, then it is adequately represented by his high Insight.  Saying that he has a Full Moon Shrewd means two things:

--His Shrewdness is intense (otherwise it would be Gibbous)

--His Shrewdness is morally aligned towards Good

From where I'm sitting, Lucifer's Shrewdness should be a New Moon Trait.  It is an intense Trait, but one that would be judged as evil.  In a way, it is an evil wisdom and should be treated as such.

How could it be turned against him?  There is always the simple matter of his thinking past his opponents.  For instance, in Lord of the Rings, the Free People counted on Sauron's not even thinking that they would destroy the Ring.  Sauron's shrewdness did not allow for such a selfless option to exist in his thinking.  Thus he was blinded to the true plan of the Free People.  His New Moon Shrewdness was activated against him.

In the current manuscript, I note that chargen in Alyria is unusual in that it requires that you sit in judgment on your character.  As you create them, you must be willing to state, "He is good.  She is evil.  This Trait is good.  This is evil."

Is this clear?  I have to run, but I'll offer further insight later.

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

I spent the night thinking about it; today I talked it over a bit with Kyler to help focus my thoughts and get his opinion. Here's what we came up with.

It seems fairly clear that Bruce's True to his Word is a good trait, even though in its present context it's being used for evil (he promises to hurt people, and once he's promised that he's not going to back down). Similarly, Doug's Trusting is a good trait that has been used against him (in that he trusts Lucifer). These would both be good traits, probably, even if the characters reversed their virtues--should Doug shift over to evil or Bruce to good, these would still be good traits.

Shrewdness may be different. It may be that it is not like Alyria traits at all; but if that's correct, I'm having a bit of trouble coming up with traits that describe some people.

The problem lies here: Lucifer's Shrewdness is a bad thing precisely because Lucifer is bad and uses it for evil. This is because he has a new virtue. Yet what if Lucifer had a crescent virtue, and then during play he was pulled to half and then to gibbous virtue? In this case, would it not be so that Lucifer could use his shrewdness for good? We would almost expect that the person who turns from evil to good who had long been crafty would still be sharp; that the person who had skill at manipulating people to get what he wanted could manipulate them to make the world better.

It thus seems that Shrewd is not the same kind of trait as these others.

On the other hand, this makes the entire thing complicated.

Would Doug's Purposeful suddenly jump from full to new if he were to tip to evil? Or is Purposeful inappropriate as a trait?

Lucifer is listed as cowardly, and that's placed at crescent; but from a grander perspective, isn't it a good thing that the villain is a coward, and shouldn't that therefore be a gibbous virtue trait?

C. S. Lewis somewhere wrote that someone with the capacity to be a great good had the capacity to be a great evil, while someone who could only be a minor good could only be a minor evil. The idea here is that the same traits that make powerful saints, when used in the other direction, make deadly fiends.

Thus I'm not certain how to rate those traits whose moral value is dependent more on their use than on their nature.

That seems to be where the problem lies. Are such traits inappropriate for Alyrian characters, and if so how do we figure out traits more clearly?

--M. J. Young

Hey, I've been really busy, but I do intend on getting back to this thread.  Your question deserves a comprehensive answer, and I haven't been able to sit down and do it.

If anyone else cares to take a shot, though, feel free to jump in.

Seth

In an otherwise unrelated e-mail,

Quote from: Seth Ben-EzraI really have been meaning to reply to your post in the forum.  I've just been swamped with Real Life and haven't had an opportunity to sit down and gather my thoughts well enough to give you a satisfactory answer.  So that you can begin play, I'd answer your question by saying that you should view the character in terms of his role within the story and assign Trait values appropriately.  In the context of *this* character, is being Shrewd evil?  If he were to suddenly gain a Full Moon Virtue, would his Shrewdness pull him towards evil?  If so, then a New Moon is appropriate.  I'll fill this out more when I post.

That's just exactly the problem. I'm inclined to think that if the character were to shift to, say, gibbous virtue, this trait would suddenly "become" good. Alyria doesn't allow for such things; thus it is problematic.

It strikes me that the problem lies in the diverse nature of Traits within the system. Sometimes a trait is what we would term a virtue or a vice. Doug's trusting, courageous, and self controlled are all virtues, and would be good things, admirable, even in a bad person. Similarly, Bruce has traits self-centered, reckless, and sadistic, all of which would be vices even if Bruce suddenly became a saint otherwise. It doesn't matter that these can be used to achieve contrary outcomes. Doug's virtue of being trusting has gotten him caught up in believing the lies Lucifer has told him; Bruce's self-centeredness could be used to stop him from going out to beat someone up because he doesn't want to be bothered or deal with the rain or something. Good things can come from exploiting vices, and bad things from exploiting virtues. There is a level in which this is inherent in the entire Diverse Lunacy system as expressed in Alyria.

However, there are also what we might call strengths and weaknesses. These are easily confused with virtues and vices, because they often seem the same to the person who has them, but they are different. Doug is purposeful; this is a good thing for Doug, because he is a good character. However, Lucifer might also be described as purposeful, and in his case it would be a morally negative trait, but still a strength of character. Similarly, it is a good thing, morally, that Teresa is loyal to her friend, because her friend is good. If Bruce were loyal to his friend Lucifer, that would be morally a bad thing in the grand scheme of things because Lucifer is evil, but it would still be a character strength (although it might also be a character virtue).

Seth suggests that Lucifer's Shrewd trait should be negative, because he uses it for evil; yet I note that he does not similarly say that Lucifer's cowardly trait should be a positive trait because the fact that he's a coward makes him less formidable a force for evil.

I'm inclined to think that virtues and vices should be distinguished from strengths and weaknesses, perhaps in the text; but that virtues and character strengths should always be positive and vices and character weaknesses should always be negatives. There may be times when this is difficult to decide, but it might clear up this particular confusion.

I think that if Lucifer suddenly had a full virtue, his shrewdness would be an asset for good; therefore I count it not a vice but a strength, and will for the moment keep it at gibbous.

From a strictly mechanics standpoint, this makes the most sense to me. Traits which are gibbous and full are generally those which are activated in favor of the character for whom they are activated; those which are crescent and new generally are those which are activated against someone. I can see Lucifer using his shrewdness to his advantage; I can see Teresa using Lucifer's cowardice to his disadvantage. If she were to activate his shrewdness against him, she would be making it the score against which he, not she, had to roll. If she activates his cowardice against him, it is she who must roll against it.

Does that make sense?

Anyway, I hope that in a few minutes I'll be playing, so I'm going to keep it as written and see how it works.

--M. J. Young

We did play last night. I had to cajole and twist arms to get everyone to the table, including promising that we would wrap up early (two players insisted they had to get to bed early because they had to get up early, although go figure, after the game they watched a movie and stayed up later than I did). We were interrupted by a grandmother's phone call during the critical scene, which derailed us for half an hour while she talked to everyone. Still, I think everyone had a good time, and the story is progressing in interesting ways.

So here is where we are.

*****

Quote from: About character assignment, weTristan wanted to play Doug.  Adam had wanted to play either Doug or Cory, and Kyler wanted to play either Cory or Teresa.  Evan immediately called Dibs on Bruce.  It was generally known that Ryan wanted to play the villain Lucifer.  If we gave Adam Cory and Kyler Teresa, it would leave Lumina for Kellie, and she would enjoy that part.  Thus parts were parceled pretty much as people preferred.

The teenaged Lumina was so upset by the news that Lucifer sent Bruce to find Teresa that she immediately went to the bathroom; meanwhile, Lucifer activated the network of informants he has built over the past decade or so to bring him information on the movements of his quarry.  He was able to determine that Teresa and Cory had left the town of Midway bound for Sussex, and provided this information to Bruce.

Quote from: Regarding character information, weThese details of character age were announced by the players at this moment, as well as Ryan's idea that Lucifer's influence included a web of contacts.

Quote from: On town names, weSussex was the first town we named.  It started when someone said Teresa was on her way to such-and-such place, which was quickly contracted to Sussex.  Kellie objected that she wanted it to be Arius, the name of a place she had created in an unrelated story, but Ryan suggested that Lumina, Lucifer, and Bruce were all from Arius.  I tossed out the name Midway as being the town between Arius and Sussex.

Bruce couldn't get to Sussex in one day and wasn't about to spend the night somewhere uncomfortable, so he took Doug to an inn and tavern in Midway.  Doug, being weak on social skills, went right to his room and went to bed; Bruce stayed in the bar drinking.

Quote from: On Bruce's character, weBruce spent his point of corruption to give himself a crescent trait of drunk, a weakness to alcohol.

Bruce was sitting in the bar drinking when Lumina reached Midway; Lumina knew only that Teresa had been bound here before, and hoped to find out where she went when she left.  Seeing Bruce at the bar, she bought him a drink and asked what he was doing out here.  He told her he was looking for a couple of freaks who went to Sussex.  After buying him another drink, she excused herself and pushed on through the night to reach Sussex before dawn.


Teresa and Cory meanwhile had reached Sussex before sunset of that first day, and gone through the familiar problems of trying to explain who they were and win acceptance in the village.  There was some distrust, but Teresa's reputation had reached the ears of some, and one of the villagers gave them a place to stay for the night.  The next morning they began moving among the villagers.

It came out in flashback that when Lucifer was telling Doug what an evil person Teresa was, he said that Teresa had once pretended she was going to help a boy draw water, but instead pushed him into a well.  Teresa admits that the boy fell into the well, but insists it was an accident.  Lucifer also said that the horn on Cory's head was like one that a dragon would have.

Lumina was reluctant to tell the night watchman that she was here to help Cory or Teresa, as she was not sure how they would take that; on the other hand, she did not wish to lie.  She told him that she had a friend who was in danger, and she needed to warn them.  The watchman let her in.

Quote from: Regarding these actions, weLumina gained a point of Inspiration for having pushed through the night to warn Teresa, which I thought was a particularly virtuous thing to have done, considering that she could have stayed at Midway for the night and still had a chance of getting to Sussex first.

Here in Sussex Teresa helped people in simple ways, persuading those with resources to help the poor, recommending remedies for illnesses and helping the sick.  Cory was a great help to her, as he would talk with people and find out what they needed, so that she could look for ways to meet those needs.

Lumina found Teresa fairly early in the day, as Sussex is a larger village but not so large that Teresa could hide in it.  There were many people crowding around Teresa and Cory, but Teresa noticed Lumina pressing through the crowd.  Lumina warned her of the danger, that Bruce was coming (she was still unaware of Doug), and Teresa thanked her but indicated she was not concerned and would certainly be able to defend herself if it came to it.  Cory noticed how tired Lumina was, and insisted that she get some rest; they took her to the house in which they were staying, and the owner was happy to give the girl a room.  Lumina slept.  Teresa and Cory continued to help people, but made sure there was a village guard nearby as they  moved through the town.

Later that day, Bruce and Doug arrived at Sussex.  There was a great moment upon their arrival, when Bruce saw the guard, dressed in the same sort of outfit as the guard at Midway.  He immediately said, "Hey, I know you.  I saw you last night at that other place."  To Doug, humans aren't that easily distinguished, so he didn't know to disagree.  Bruce told the guard that they had a job in town, and were coming to do it, and managed to confuse the man enough that he let them in.

Quote from: In reporting this situation, weWhen Evan had Bruce mistake the gate guard at Sussex for the gate guard at Midway, we all fell into gales of laughter; it will be a long remembered game moment.

At the moment that they entered the town, they did not see Teresa or Cory, but they did see a tavern.  Doug suggested that Teresa and Cory might be staying there, and Bruce thought it a good place to check.  The innkeeper told them that yes, the people they sought were somewhere in town, but no they weren't staying here; he also tried to coax them to take rooms, but Doug insisted that they would first have to determine whether they were staying, so they left the inn to continue their search.

It did not take too long for Bruce and Doug to find Teresa and Cory; as it happened, they were outside the house in which they were staying.  Bruce pointed them out.  Doug's social skills are not so good, but he had by now realized that Bruce wasn't that bright.  He suggested that Bruce wait while he approached Teresa.  He wished to be certain that this was the evil person he had been sent to destroy.

Teresa certainly recognized that Bruce was the sort of person who would be sent to hurt someone; she did not know what sort of creature Doug was, but as he was wearing a sword she realized he could be dangerous.  She watched as Doug approached.  Doug asked whether she was indeed Teresa, and whether this was Cory, and she said that was correct.  After this, things started to heat up.  Doug said that Teresa was a dragon cultist; Teresa started to lose her temper.  She accused him of "also" being a dragon cultist; at this point she was raising her voice, and Bruce clearly heard her.  Not understanding quite what was going on, he said he, too, was a dragon cultist.  Doug is now clearly confused.  Cory is trying to calm Teresa, who does not want to be calmed.  Lumina awoke in the midst of this, and heard everyone yelling that they were all dragon cultists; she thought to herself that she had warned them, but no one listened.  She was also confused at this point as to who was on what side.

Quote from: About the details, weThe sword was invented at this moment, when I asked whether Doug had a weapon, and whether he was carrying it or wearing it.

Cory was trying to keep people cool, and he realized that whatever Doug was, he was not an ordinary human.  He asked, "What are you?"  Doug, of course, responded that he was a Digger Paladin; but Cory said he didn't know what that was.  Could Doug explain what that was?  Doug's only explanation was that a digger paladin is what he was, and that he came from a place where there were lots of diggers.  Cory, however, pointed out that there weren't any diggers here; that this made Doug different from most people, much as he and Teresa were different.  Doug said that there was a difference, but he couldn't explain what the difference was.  He also said that Teresa was a dragon cultist, that she actually said she was a dragon cultist.  Teresa shot back that she only said that because he said it first, and that she was not a dragon cultist.  Doug argued that if she wasn't one she certainly shouldn't have said she was one.

The argument between Teresa and Doug was not going anywhere.

Quote from: In resolving this conflict, weDoug used his Gibbous Force, and Teresa her Gibbous Determination.  He activated her New Short Temper against her, saying that she was too angry to stay in control; she activated his Gibbous Self-Controlled against him, saying that he would not allow himself to go too far until he was certain he was doing the right thing.  These cancelled out, leaving Gibbous against Gibbous, and both players rolled Half.

The two glared at each other, neither backing down.  Cory wanted to calm Teresa, but Bruce acted first, charging at Teresa with the intent to do bodily harm.

Quote from: Concerning this conflict, weIn this contest, Bruce was using his Full Force; Teresa also decided to use her Force, which was at Crescent.  Bruce activated his Sadistic, at Crescent, against her, saying that he was going to enjoy this; but Teresa activated Bruce's New Reckless against him, saying that he was out of control and unable to do what he wanted.  Bruce rolled New, and Teresa rolled Full.

Teresa opened that door just a crack as Bruce charged, and hit him with a wall of force that knocked him flat on his back unconscious.

Doug started to back down a bit.  Although this show of force unnerved him, it also tended to confirm his belief that Teresa was evil and dangerous, despite recognizing that Bruce was the aggressor in the conflict.  He felt that it proved Lucifer had told him the truth about Teresa, even if he might have been wrong about Cory.  Meanwhile, Cory was finally trying to calm Teresa, who still did not wish to be calmed.

Quote from: About this, weWe decided this was a contest as well.  Cory used his full insight, and Teresa her Gibbous determination.  Teresa activated Cory's Crescent Lacks Confidence against him, saying he wouldn't be able to overcome her determination, but Cory activated her Full Good-hearted against her, saying she would be unwilling to hurt him.  Since both of these traits would go against Teresa's roll, they cancelled, leaving Cory to roll Gibbous and Teresa to roll Full.  That is what they rolled, suggesting that both were successful but Teresa more so.  Kyler, playing Teresa, narrated.

Teresa did not calm down; but she did throw a wasted glare at the blind Cory, and said, "Well then, you deal with him."  She then stood there glaring at Doug.

Cory did not deal with Doug; he found his way over to where Bruce was lying, and tried to see if the thug was all right.  He helped the man wake up.  Doug came over, now thinking that Cory is probably a good person, but Teresa isn't.  He has also started to realize that Cory's horn is more like the Unicorn in his vision than like any image of a dragon he's ever seen.  He prodded Bruce with his foot and encouraged the fallen brute to get up.  Teresa also approached, but kept her distance, unwilling to put herself at risk.  She remembered telling Lumina that she was quite ready to defend herself, and felt a certain self-satisfaction at having done so.

Cory helped Bruce to his feet, and Doug, wanting in part to regroup and consider how to approach the problem, insisted on helping Bruce back to the inn.  Bruce wanted to know if they'd killed Teresa yet, or at least pounded her, but Doug told him that Teresa had pounded him.

Teresa, meanwhile, headed off into the crowd to return to helping people, once she was certain Cory would follow.

Lucifer has heard already that his people have arrived in Sussex and caught up with his enemies; but he has also heard that Lumina got there first and warned them.  His response was to tell his informants to keep a tight eye on Lumina as well; he is the sort of villain who won't move himself if he can get others to do his work for him.  He will learn later tonight of the fiasco of this first confrontation, and will be decidedly unhappy about it.
*****
That carries us this far. We're looking forward to what happens next, although a lot of the things we thought probably would happen are not as clear now--which is a very interesting aspect of play. Kellie is considering whether Lumina should die at the end; Ryan is looking for the right moment for Lucifer to step out from behind his network of spies and become directly involved (and Bruce's stupidity combined with Doug's uncertainty are pushing this direction). What will happen is anyone's guess at this point.

--M. J. Young

Sounds like a great run so far!   Just a few questions:

1)  It seems as though all Trait activation has been countered so far.  Have you perceived this to be a problem?

2)  How well have your players handled the free-form "magic" power, like the Blessing?  I saw one instance of use; have your players grasped the flavor of the power well?

3)  I saw that you used the conflict system for Cory and Teresa's argument.  I completely agree with that decision, but I'm curious who called for its use.  Was the text sufficiently clear to indicate that this was the right time?

4)  Many actions are adjudicated without use of a dice roll.  How has that been going?  Are the rules clear enough on how to deal with these situations?

5)  How has actual play affected the opinion on Trait assignment which you expressed earlier in this thread?  Has it been confirmed, or is it still an open question?

I am looking forward to hearing the rest of this story.

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

Quote from: Seth 'GreatWolf' Ben-EzraJust a few questions:

Well, that's what playtesters are for, so I'll do my best to answer them. I warn you, though, that I hadn't really been thinking about all these, so the answers are pretty much off-the-cuff and I may reconsider them later.

Quote from: Seth1)  It seems as though all Trait activation has been countered so far.  Have you perceived this to be a problem?

I don't think I'd say it was a problem; but then, I think it works because of a specific interpretation of the rules that I'm not 100% sure is what they currently say (having raised the question previously).

Obviously, if a player raises a trait that is positive, it's generally intended that the other character is going to have to roll against it, rather than whatever attribute was raised. (We have not seen the situation in which someone raised a gibbous trait to lower the target from a full attribute; that only occurs to me now as a possibility.) Similarly, if it is a negative trait, it is assumed that the character activating the trait is using that to make their roll easier (and again, we haven't seen a character activate a crescent trait to make the roll tougher for the opponent against a new attribute).

Thus, we distinguish the impact of trait activation based on who has to roll against each trait. The double activation cancels, restoring the attribute, if and only if both traits were activated for the same character to roll against. If the traits are activated for different characters to roll against, then they stand.

Thus, if Lucifer were to activate his full shrewd and Lumina her gibbous brave, Lucifer would have to roll at least gibbous and Lumina at least full. If in a conflict between Cory and Teresa, Teresa activated her gibbous Caring in her favor but Cory activated her full Loyal against her, she would have to roll full and he would have to roll caring. But if Lucifer activated his full shrewd against Teresa and she activated his crescent cowardly against him, because those are both traits against her roll, they would cancel and put the roll back to whatever attribute Lucifer used.

I was concerned at one point as to whether the trait activation was being made based on gamist concerns, that is, choosing the scores that gave the best chance of success in the situation; that fear was significantly mitigated in the Teresa/Bruce confrontation when, after Evan announced that Bruce was using his full force and charging at Teresa, Kyler replied that Teresa would also use her Force, which is at crescent, because that was how he thought she would respond, despite the fact that she's got full insight. So I think people did consider how it would fit within the story.

Quote from: Then Seth2)  How well have your players handled the free-form "magic" power, like the Blessing?  I saw one instance of use; have your players grasped the flavor of the power well?

This is still a bit weak, I think. No notion of using the blessing in the confrontation was considered until after the dice were rolled--but then, I think no one expected Teresa to win that conflict, and once she'd done it it became a matter of figuring out how she had succeeded. The idea that she had hit him with that power seemed to be the best answer. In that sense, it was a decision based on the demands of the story; but after the fact it occurred to me that had it been a failure or a blood moon we probably would not have thought of the blessing. There is a part of me that thinks that the use of such powers should be stated before the dice are rolled; but there is also a part of me that thinks this would not work, since it would narrow the options for whoever is narrating significantly. If Teresa had said she was going to block Bruce with the force, and she'd lost the roll, that narration would have to consider what happened with the blessing use and why it didn't stop Bruce. So I'm not sure either whether this is a serious problem or how to fix it.

Quote from: Next, Seth3)  I saw that you used the conflict system for Cory and Teresa's argument.  I completely agree with that decision, but I'm curious who called for its use.  Was the text sufficiently clear to indicate that this was the right time?

I called for it, as narrator. I did so because I perceived that Adam was trying quite well to do the calming thing and Kyler was holding on to the angry temper aspect, and that it made the most sense to roll the outcome. I can't cite chapter and verse, but I certainly got the impression from the rules that whenever there was a conflict between two characters, particularly major story characters (which seems a better designation that PCs), it was resolved by die roll--or perhaps, it was resolved by die roll if it did not resolve in a moment through role playing. That is, when Bruce and Doug entered town, they saw the Tavern, and there was a brief discussion about whether to go there. Bruce said they had to find the freaks; Doug said that they might be staying at the inn, so that would be the first place to look. Once they were there, the innkeeper offered to set them up with rooms, and Bruce said maybe they should do that and have a drink, but Doug said that they should first find out whether the person they were seeking was actually in town, and Bruce agreed. Thus those could have been conflicts that might have required die rolls, but instead the role playing settled them quickly.

I probably wouldn't have noticed that without this question; good question. Yes, I think it was clear from the text that when there was a disagreement between characters, the dice settle the outcome and the players must roleplay to match the dice.

Quote from: Then he4)  Many actions are adjudicated without use of a dice roll.  How has that been going?  Are the rules clear enough on how to deal with these situations?

This is a much tougher one to answer.

One thing that I think several people took as given I'm not certain is in the rules: the standard improv theatre rule that you don't contradict what someone else has already stated. You either say, "Yes, and" or "Yes but", never "No". The most surprising appearance of that was when Lucifer told Doug that Teresa had pushed a boy in a well. My reaction to it was that it was a lie invented by the devious villain to mislead the paladin; it wasn't the sort of thing Teresa would ever have done. Kyler deserves credit on this, because rather than denying it, he took the event as real and declared it to have been an accident. So sometimes things were resolved essentially by whoever established them. On the other hand, when Bruce said that the gate guard at Sussex was the same guy as the gate guard at Midway, we all took it as playing Bruce's stupidity (no one thought for a moment that it actually was the same guy). I'm not sure we even said it wasn't the same guy; we just all took it as a character mistake.

I can imagine a situation in which there might be a disagreement about the game reality; we didn't have one, but we might have come close.

Before the confrontation between Teresa and Doug, it had been established 1) that Doug and Bruce found Teresa and Cory somewhere in town, and 2) that Lumina was asleep in the house in which Teresa and Cory were guests. During the confrontation, Kellie asked whether Lumina woke up. I replied that Lumina would awaken whenever Kellie wished for her to awaken, and could arrive on the scene whenever Kellie thought it would work for the story. Then, seeing that she thought it would be valuable for her character to be involved at this point, I announced that the argument was happening in front of the house in which Lumina was sleeping, and that it woke Lumina.

I can imagine a situation in which someone might have objected for one reason or another that it didn't take place there--perhaps because they envisioned it taking place near the gate or the inn or some other established landmark. That didn't happen. I'm not sure how that kind of disagreement would be resolved under the rules.

I should add that I've read the rules in a somewhat hasty and disjointed manner (like I read most things longer than a forum post anymore). Kyler has read the rules several times (he's a voracious reader), and I should probably ask him about this--but he's asleep.

Quote from: Finally, Seth5)  How has actual play affected the opinion on Trait assignment which you expressed earlier in this thread?  Has it been confirmed, or is it still an open question?

I would say that it's less open than it was. The problem with "closing" it would be that Lucifer has stayed in the background thus far, and so we haven't really seen how his traits are going to function in play. On the other hand, seeing how the other traits worked in play, I think the more that there there is a difference between virtue/vice and strength/weakness, but that both should be Alyria traits.

Looking at Doug v. Teresa in retrospect, we see that Teresa has a short temper; this could be characterized as either vice or weakness, but either way it's negative. Doug has self-control, which is probably more a strength than a virtue--a self-controlled villain would use that to evil advantage. In effect, Tristan claimed that Teresa would lose her temper and so lose the argument, and Kyler claimed that Doug, being self controlled, wouldn't push her that far without certainty, so the two traits cancelled.

In the Teresa/Bruce conflict, Bruce activated his sadistic, a vice, against Teresa, in essence saying that because he liked hurting people he would be able to overpower her. (Interestingly, this did not in any way benefit Bruce, who would have had to roll against a crescent force, and instead rolled against a crescent trait, so this is a case of the trait activation providing story color rather than resolution advantage.) Teresa activated Bruce's Reckless, probably more a weakness than a vice, against him, arguing that although he was violent, he wasn't controlled, and would fall easily. In this case, the mechanics resulted in the two traits being unrelated, and thus non-cancelling; and the logic of the scene also suggested that they were unrelated. So the mechanics fit the scene.

In Cory versus Teresa (yeah, Teresa seems to be the focus of the conflict around here), we have a weakness in Cory, lack of confidence, activated against him, and a virtue in Teresa, good-hearted, activated against her. The mechanics thus suggest that since these are both activated to Teresa's roll, they cancel; and the story suggests that what is happening is that Teresa sees that she could take advantage of Cory's lack of confidence, but her good heart prevents her from doing so, putting it back to the attribute conflict.

This is a good example. One could argue that if a strength in a villain (such as Lucifer's shrewd) is a negative, then it is equally logical that a weakness in a villain (such as his cowardly) is a virtue. But let's suppose it was Bruce who lacked confidence. If Teresa were to activate that against him and he were to activate good-hearted against her, we would want it to come out much the same way: that she perceived she could intimidate him through his lack of confidence, but was too kind to take advantage of that. The other way, we would have both traits activated, Teresa rolling against a high lack of confidence and Bruce rolling against a high good-hearted, and the narration makes less sense, I think.

Thus I think that virtues and strengths are always good traits and weaknesses and vices are always bad ones. To identify these, a virtue would be a good thing in anyone who had it--Teresa's good-hearted, Bruce's True to his Word--even if it results in an evil outcome sometimes--Doug's Trusting. Similarly, a vice would be a bad thing in anyone who had it. A strength will be the kind of thing that would be good in a good character and bad in a bad character--courageous, shrewd--and a weakness the reverse.

I think most of the cases in which it's not clear whether something is a virtue or a strength, a vice or a weakness, don't really matter. There aren't a lot of cases in which you wonder whether something is a vice or a strength, a virtue or a weakness, as far as I can see.

As to the next installment, Kyler was just asking me tonight when that will be. Maybe we'll get it going this weekend. There's talk of creating another character for Mom to play.

--M. J. Young

Our story continued tonight (that is, Saturday into Sunday morning); here is the current addition.

I should say that unlike the first session, there was some excitement about this. I mentioned late in the afternoon that I was hoping I could finish my work (of which I was heavily burdened today) and we could play Alyria, and immediately there was a lot of buzz about it. Before I knew it, the dinner was cleared away, the table washed, and the papers put out, and I was persuaded to leave some of my work for later and come to the game. All of the players were waiting.

*****

Doug took Bruce back to the inn and arranged rooms; he made certain Bruce was settled in his own before going to bed himself.  Teresa and Cory continued helping people, and then retired to the house where they were staying.  Lumina, who had slept most of the day, joined them for dinner.  It was pork and potatoes, Lumina's favorite.

Teresa was a bit brusque with Lumina, suggesting that she should return home to Arius in the morning.  Teresa was only concerned with the girl's safety, but Lumina took it badly?took it in the sense of an older person (Teresa is about twenty-seven) suggesting that a teenager is still just a child.  She stormed off to her room, and decided that in the morning she would return to Arius.

Quote from: About this conduct, weLumina got a point of corruption for throwing a hissy fit.

Teresa also announced that in the morning she and Cory would be leaving for Nexton.

Quote from: Regarding names, weNexton was invented by Kyler as the name of the next town.

Back in Arius, Lucifer had heard the essentials of the day's fiasco.  He decided that Bruce was reliable; the man had failed, but would not give up.  Thus Lucifer stayed in Arius.

Teresa was intent on escaping, and so roused Cory and rushed out of the town.  Lumina, who had slept all of the day before and so was not so tired at night, had already left, but had decided to spend the night back in Midway this time rather than attempt to push through to Arius.  However, she also decided that upon reaching Arius she would confront Lucifer.

Doug rose reasonably early as well, wanting to again find Teresa.  He got Bruce and headed out to look for her.  He discovered that he had just missed her, but that she was bound for Nexton, and he and Bruce left immediately, intent on catching up with their quarry on the road.

Quote from: As to this conflict, weWhether Teresa was going to be able to avoid Doug became a contest.  It was insight against insight, weak attributes for both?Doug's is new and Teresa's crescent.  Doug activated his full purposeful in his favor, saying that since he knew he had to find her, he would leave early enough to do so; Teresa activated Doug's crescent socially inept against him, saying that he wouldn't be able to find out where she was because he doesn't have the skills to get information from people.  Teresa rolled half and Doug crescent, both successes but more so for Teresa.

Teresa, however, was not actually bound for Nexton.  She was scared, and she was running.  After heading in the direction of Nexton initially, she and Cory left that road and struck out for Faraway.

Bruce and Doug got about half way to Nexton when it occurred to Bruce that they should at least have seen Teresa and Cory by that time, unless the pair were a lot faster afoot than he thought.  They could have gone anywhere, but certainly they did not go to Nexton.  He changed course, and took them to Otherton to see if there was any sign of the trail there.  There wasn't.

Quote from: Because there was a contest here, weIt seemed that Teresa's effort to elude Bruce and Doug had to be rolled somehow.  I chose Bruce as the person she was evading, and Bruce chose to use his crescent determination to keep after her.  Teresa used her crescent insight to evade.  She also activated his New Reckless against him, saying that he wouldn't be able to pick up the trail because care was required; but, prompted by Ryan who plays Lucifer, Bruce activated his Full True to his Word, saying that he was already upset with himself that he'd failed at Sussex and lost her.  These cancelled.  Teresa rolled crescent and Bruce half, both successes but a better success for Bruce.  It was difficult for anyone to figure out how Bruce could be successful without Teresa failing, and I stepped in and narrated that Bruce listed several towns to which Teresa might have gone, including Sussex, Midway, Otherton, and Faraway, and chose to start looking in Otherton, with Faraway his next intended stop.

Lucifer learned that Teresa had slipped the net.  He knew she had left Sussex bound for Nexton, but that she had never reached Nexton.  He knew that Bruce had realized this in time to change course, and had reached Otherton, but that Teresa wasn't there.  His spies reported no sign of her in Midway or Sussex, either; but they did report that Lumina was headed back to Arius.

The next day, Teresa and Cory fled from Faraway into the wilderness.  Bruce and Doug made the journey from Otherton to Faraway, and learned that Teresa and Cory had been there that morning and left for parts unknown.  Bruce counted this a victory, and planned to try to track her down the next day.  Lumina returned to Arius, intent on speaking to Lucifer, but not certain what to say.  That evening she headed to his home to confront him.

Lumina had mentioned to Teresa that she had once seen Lucifer headed into the mountains late at night, and thought that it must have been for nefarious reasons; she actually suspected him of being a dragon cultist.  At the time Teresa discounted this as judgmental and a bit silly?the fact that you saw a man going to a strange place at a strange time does not make him a dragon cultist.  However, Lucifer did have such meetings, and in fact had one that night.  He was thus attempting to leave the house in a hurry, and even attempted to arrange with his household servant that if Lumina arrived she should be told that he had business and would see her the next day.  Then rushing out of the house for his meeting, he nearly ran her over, and she insisted on talking to him immediately.

Quote from: On this difficult issue, weWhether Lucifer would be able to avoid Lumina was the current contest; the meeting was something I threw in to try to push the scenario into something happening?the dispersion of the characters seemed to my mind to be breaking down into a fragmented might-have-been story, and I wanted there to be something to push it forward to something.  Lumina decided her Gibbous Determination would keep her at it until she found him; Lucifer tried to use his Full Insight to avoid this.  Lumina activated her gibbous bravery, saying she would courageously confront him, but Lucifer activated her full principled against her, on the basis that she would not be so gauche as to push past his household servant.  Then Lumina decided to spend a point of inspiration to make it come out in favor of good.  Lucifer debated whether to spend a point of corruption to cancel this and throw it back to the dice.  We were not certain whether that was correct, but it seemed inappropriate to say that he could not, since the resolution system tries to avoid the "who said it first" aspect.  However, Lucifer shrewdly decided to hold on to his corruption points.  It was then difficult to determine how this could be resolved for Good.  At first, Kyler suggested that someone told Lumina she'd missed Lucifer, who had been seen headed out to the mountains.  Ryan objected that this thing about the mountains had not been established, but after discussion about the difference between a player creating and a character lying, it was determined that Lumina had seen Lucifer going to the mountains, but that the cult meetings were actually not in the mountains but in the forest.  Kelly and I felt that Lumina missing Lucifer completely and getting nothing out of it did not "advance good" in any significant way, particularly in view of the fact that a point of inspiration had been spent.  We tossed the narration to Ryan, who said that given all the circumstances about the best he could see was that Lumina caught Lucifer as he left the house, and so was able to confront him.

Lumina insisted that Lucifer was up to something, and had sent Bruce to do something to Teresa.  Lucifer suggested that Bruce was his own man, that although sometimes he would hire Bruce to do something for him, this time he knew no reason to connect him to Bruce.  Lumina then said that she'd spoken to Bruce, and Bruce had told her he was working for Lucifer.  Lucifer cursed Bruce under his breath, and then explained that he had important business and could talk to Lumina tomorrow.  Lumina demanded that he talk to her tonight, and provide her with an explanation.  She reminded him that her father was also a very influential member of the community.  They were at a standoff.

Quote from: Concerning these events, weKelly invented the influential father at this point.  The confrontation at this point seemed to be about whether Lumina could convince Lucifer to answer her; she again used her gibbous determination against his full insight, as he attempted to persuade her that she should come back tomorrow.  She again activated her gibbous bravery to stand up to him, but he activated her Full Principled against her, saying that she would have to recognize that he was being reasonable in agreeing to speak with her the next day and that she was being unreasonable in insisting that he do so immediately.  Both rolled New, unresolved double failure.

Eager to get to his meeting and unwilling to get caught up in a long argument, Lucifer suggested that he had to go, but if she was that determined to speak with him she should come back later that night, at about moon set, and he would talk with her then.  After some expression of reservations, she agreed.  Lucifer headed to his meeting, leaving Lumina behind.

Camped somewhere in the wilderness, Cory asked Teresa to describe Doug; he said it was obvious that Doug was different, but he wondered what a digger looked like.  Teresa said it wasn't important; that just as she and Cory looked different from everyone else, so Doug looked different from everyone else, and looking different was looking different, it didn't matter about the details.

Quote from: In the end, weAt this point, a couple people were wearing out, including me; Kelly was having trouble thinking of what Lumina would say to Lucifer; and it was getting a bit late for Adam to be up.  So we called it a night, and agreed to return next time and begin with Lumina's later confrontation of Lucifer.

*****

Again, that's the story to date.

--M. J. Young

I'm beginning to have some worries about how things are going; I'm not exactly certain what to do about it, but hopefully if I can lay out some of the concerns I can get a handle on whether I should take any action.

I have some concern as to whether my players' gamist tendencies might be creeping into play. It doesn't seem to be impacting their mechanics decisions significantly--they're still choosing attributes which are appropriate, and we had only one situation in which someone tried to activate a trait for which no one could see any sense but the value, but there are some choices of action that are odd and some comments that suggest they suspect each other of this. Most notably, Kyler's decision to have Teresa attempt to get away from Bruce completely so that no one would know where she was seems a bit like trying to win; but he feels like Ryan's careful plotting play of Lucifer is calculated to cause the villain to win in the end, and that this is a violation of the spirit of what we're trying to accomplish. There has also been a lot of joking about Lucifer's efforts to corrupt Doug.

There is also an aspect of an uncertainty about how long this should go. I was playing it as if we would tell the story in a couple of sessions; Ryan, running Lucifer, has been holding back considerably as if he expects it to go several sessions before he has to become involved directly in events. I think that stemming from this uncertainty, we're getting a bit of loss of focus--the villain won't become involved directly, and so we can't push it to a climax, but there isn't much more room to build so it's starting to fall off. Now, maybe my concerns are misplaced--I can see it swelling again, even fluctuating a bit over time. It's just that at this moment it feels like the game tension has dispersed.

And speaking of dispersion, my characters have now pretty much split up. Cory and Teresa are hiding in the wilderness, Bruce and Doug have found their last known address but don't really have a clear lead on them, and Lumina is back in Arius with Lucifer, the two of them at least four days' journey from Teresa and Cory. There is very little I could see that would bring them back together at this point, as Teresa is quite reasonably hiding and Lucifer is also fairly reasonably keeping his position secure.

This leads to a mechanics problem. There were a couple of times in play tonight where there was a gut reaction that a player really needed to roll for something, but there wasn't anyone to roll against. At one point Lucifer wanted to expand his network of contacts to reach the towns beyond those he'd already reached, and I couldn't really figure how to do this; it hasn't been incorporated, really, because even if he were to succeed it should logically take a bit of time. The effort to track Teresa was reduced to a contest between tracker and tracked, but this is going to run into problems eventually. After all, if it comes down to Bruce always seeking and Teresa always hiding, each session will require a roll to see if he can find her yet, or else a statement that it was already determined that he'll never find her. Each roll will either mean he didn't find her yet, or that he found her. She can't escape forever. At one point it occurred to me that I might let her run to the Citadel, but I can't imagine anyone ever finding her there, so I avoided it--but if she did go there, even though I can't imagine her being found, it would still seem that Bruce would eventually roll a success and so find her.

Thus I am wondering whether I need to do anything to bring the characters back together, and whether I need to do anything to nudge this toward a conclusion, or whether on the other hand it might be good for the story to let it stretch into this dispersion and then wait for it to come back together.

As an aside, it was noticed tonight that most of our contests seem to have been Teresa against someone. Teresa has won more contests than anyone else has entered. Kyler is getting nervous about his dice luck--thus far no one has rolled a blood moon, but since he's rolling the dice more than anyone else, he's betting it will be he who does so if he can't reduce the conflicts he faces. This seems to be part of the impetus for the flight--to get away from Bruce and Doug so that he doesn't have to roll. He may be all to aware of the power that could be unleashed if a blessed character rolls a blood moon.

Insights and advice solicited.

--M. J. Young

Hi M.J,

How powerful is Lucifer's 'network of spies' ? I don't think you specified whether the 'Spies' simply exist, or if they're a Trait of Lucifer's, or a separate component on the Relationship Map with their own Virtue, Insight, etc. However, they always seem to deliver absolutely reliable information, which encourages Lucifer to stay behind the scenes.

What I'm asking is: Does Lucifer ever need to roll in order to get the information he does? Any time Lucifer wants to know something, you could have a contest of Spies versus Teresa. Or you could make their information less reliable the further away from Arius they are (as the resources of the network become more stretched). Without perfect information, Lucifer is going to have to make some tough decisions and perhaps get involved more personally.

Another thought that just struck me: as you say, expanding his network will take time, and this recruitment seems like the sort of thing Lucifer would have to do in person - in other words, travelling outside of Arius.

As to the fragmentation of the story, I wasn't that worried. The Conflict is "Teresa has been targeted for assassination". Unless Teresa decides to confront Lucifer, the characters will probably stay widely separated. However, things may get shaken up if Doug ever discovers he's been lied to. Remember, Bruce admitted he was a dragon cultist.

I did find it interesting that so far Lumina seems to be the only one who's making moral choices regarding the Conflict. Her decision to confront Lucifer seems brave to me.

Steve.