This was indeed one long game. I think we started at 11:30, and we actually ended at 5:00, so about 5.5 hours. I have to say that Christoffer did an *excellent* job, because I'd only intended to stay for an hour, maybe two at the most, but once we got going absolutely had to stay until the end. He kept asking things like "How's the schedule?" And I was like "We passed the deadline 15 minutes ago! Shut up and keep going!!" :)

The Horror Master wrote:
I think there was a lot of things that was obvious to me from the rules which wasn't equally obvious to the players at least at first. One of the more amusing things was playing the negative traits, at least I thought that was very funny, especially when Chris succeeded with his: "Always says the wrong thing" skill making up for a lot of misunderstandings.

As far as I'm concerned, the mechanics played a very small role in last nights game. We could have done the same thing with the Window, Fable, FUDGE, or any other freeform system. IMO, what carried the game was the skill of the GM (and it was uber!). To me, the system was pretty unremarkable, with the exception of the "make successes to do bad stuff" rolls, which is a lot of fun. I was about to suggest that you make that the main focus of the system, when I realized that SQUEAM already does this.

The biggest problem I had with the system was in assigning values to the traits. Creation system is freeform, and a 1 - 20 scale is just to big to feel comfortable. To me, anyway. I'd prefer a smaller scale, or even no scale at all, with traits depending on their existence rather than their rating. (Maybe they could allow rerolls, or something.)

...

Now, knowing that Pale Fire likes illusionism, what I really want to know is how much of last night was pre-scripted? Did you really have the whole adventure thought out ahead of time? If so, you did an excellent job hiding it. To me it felt like our actions were driving the story; but at the same time it had that great suspense movie "what's gonna happen next?" feel. Mike, maybe a good candidate for participationism here. :)

So, anyway, that's pretty much it. Session summary follows. Chris, Pale Fire, fill in the gaps!

WARNING! It's long! I think it's good reading, but then, I played the game too. :)

As for the plot, it went something like this:

A bunch of boarding-school-ish highschool kids are basically setting up their friend Nate. Nate's parents are, apparently, Filthy Rich (TM), and have just acquired a mondo new pad, complete with built-in library, big bathroom, multiple bedrooms, a ballroom, etc. etc. Nate's parents, it seems, are so rich that they can happily go on a trip just two weeks after moving into this glorious mansion. So, while they're gone, Nate's having a sleepover with his buds (the aforlisted characters). The "setting up" angle is that Nate's friends are going to meet his parents before they go, act all warm and fuzzy, and promiss to play nice while the parents are on their trip. Of course, the plan is that as soon as the parent's tail-lights disappear we call everyone in sight (and not in sight) for a huge party.

So, we started out in the van on the way to Nate's new digs. Biff <grunt> was driving, and the rest of us were enduring the long drive in various ways. Much comic character interraction was had among the characters, mostly revolving around Adam (who established a reputation for throwing up all over everything, all the time) and Chass (who REALLY had to go to the bathroom, and ended up hitting the hedge - much to Nate's dismay - when everyone took too long getting inside.)

So, we go in the house, but Nate's parents don't seem to be there. Nate is somewhat upset by this, since their car is still parked outside. Finally someone suggests that they might have taken a taxi and left early, and this seems to calm him down. So everyone explores the house looking for a place to party. We discover such interesting locales as a ball room, a master bed room with big ol' bath (I think we spent more time here than any other single room... ;), a kitchen, a library, an attic in which the lights are broke, and a cellar with a funny smell, also no lights.

We never did find out what was down in that cellar. (What was down in the cellar, GM?)

So everyone starts getting ready for the party. Mandy goes and takes a bath, while Chass grabs a snack in the kitchen. Wierd... Chass finds a cell phone in the refridgerator, next to some car keys. (Still don't know what it was doing there, or how it got there.)

So, after about an hour Mandy emerges from the tub, and everyone gathers in the party place to invite the rest of the crowd. There's some discussion of who to invite (Biff wants "Lotsagirls" and his bud "Johnny." Bubba, the Token Black Dude, invites a whole crowd of Fine Women.).

There's some squabbling over Mandy's cell phone, when Chass (who has been trying to get psyched up to hit on her all afternoon) remembers the cell phone in the fridge, and goes to get it. Nate recognizes it as his mom's phone and gets all upset again.

An absolutely hillarious (IMO anyway) sequence ensued with Nate questioning Chass, and Chass holding out on him because his player (Chris Edwards) had honestly forgotten that he found the cell phone in an unusual location (i.e., the fridge).

So, the other guests finally arive, including Mandy's friends Diane, Rachel, Mindy, and Biff's bud Johnny who has brought along a bunch of other guys we've never met, including - it turns out - his buddy Fred. Kimberly was also supposed to show up, but for some reason she never arrived.

And the party gets into high gear. Everyone's pretty soggy. Mandy and Chass seem to be getting along fine, dancing to Wild Thing in the ballroom. Then Jimmy comes in - pretty drunk - and switches the tunes to Everyone was Kung Fu Fighting, to which he performs some pretty awesome moves. The local girls seem to be pretty impressed by this. :)

Chass got in a great comment about "the Drunken Master" at this point. :)

Jimmy takes the girls off to "teach them his moves" (at their request). Then Chass and Mandy hear the van starting up. Seems like folks are leaving. Biff's still there, though, drooling in the corner, lights out.

Then Adam comes in. It seems most everyone else has gone to another party with Johnny. When Mandy understands this she lets go of Chass and heads off to look for her friends. She doesn't get too far though, being drunk. She ends up on the floor. Cue the entrance of Fred.

Fred is all nice and friendly. He picks Mandy up off the floor and makes to take her to the couch. Chass is upset by this. "She's not your baby, swiftness!"

So Chass lurches forward and bangs Fred on the head with his beer can, then drops it. Fred is naturally upset by this - there's beer in his hair now. So he goes for Chass (still holding Mandy) and trips over Chass's beer can and knocks himself out. (Some really good rolling by Chass's player at this point... :)

Adam is yelling about Chass killing Fred, then Jimmy and his girls come back in. The girls take one look and flee, but Jimmy comes over to investigate. Chass spends the rest of the evening telling everyone that he "kicked Fred's ass." Jimmy is somewhat incredulous - justifiably so. :)

Mandy goes all gushy and tells Chass how brave he is. Chass succeeds at an "always say the wrong thing" roll, and comes up with one of the best lines of the game:

<Mandy> You were so BRAVE Chass!
<Chass> and you were so.. um.. yeah... I like your um... yeah.
<Chass> Im a virgin

At which point everyone disolves into laughter, except for Adam who pulls out a minidisc recorder and boasts to Chass: "Now I have it on tape." Seems Adam got some of the "wild thing" out in the woods and taped it for the benifit of braging rights. Chass goes for him, trips over his own feet, and Adam passes out. They all end up on the floor, where Chas makes ANOTHER "say the wrong thing" roll.

<Mandy> Are you okay Chass?
<Chass> um, yeah, I think so... better now anyway.
<Chass> Is that you or Adam I smell?
* Mandy straightens up looking floored
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> At this opportune moment, Adam takes the moment to fart, despite being unconscious.
<Mandy> I... uh...
<Chass> uhhh!

So, anyway, everyone splits up to go to bed. Chass heads up to the master bedroom to take a shower, and Mandy (scared of the dark) sacks out on the couch.

At this point we had a split in narration, so I only know what happened from Mandy's perspective... Chris will have to fill in Chass's stuff.

Anyway, Mandy goes to sleep on the couch, but wakes up with someone touching her. First thought: Chass is back from the shower, and finally has worked up enough guts to score with her. But something warm drips on her, and she figures that even if Chass got out of the shower, the water wouldn't still be warm. So she sits up all sleepy and helpless. Nate's there, all covered in blood, but alive. (All we could ever get out of him was that someone banged him on the head while he was on the way to the van.)

So Mandy freaks out and screams and stuff. She gets ahold of herself (kind of) and starts babbling about "applying pressure" and "stopping bleeding." And she made her "naieve airhead" roll. (GM said: "Mandy, think of a really bad way to apply pressure.") So, she ripps off her T-shirt and wraps it around Nate's head.

Chass runs in wearing Nate's Dad's bathrobe. Incoherent dialogue ensues. The shirt is removed from Nate. Chass eventually tries to stop the bleeding using Nate's Dad's bathrobe belt. It doesn't work so well. Bubba comes running in to see what's going on. He's a bit upset.

So, more incoherent dialogue ensues, the upshot of which is that we end up searching the house for the other guys (safety in numbers) but they've all disappeared, and their cell-phones are dead. Someone was supposed to take Nate to the bathroom and patch him up, but I don't think that ever happened. As far as I know we kind of lost track of him in the search. We ended up back in the kitchen. We talk about going back to bed, having a snack first (Mandy wants to get cleaned up, as she's all over blood, and only wearing a bra and shorts).

Chass goes to the freezer to get ice cream for Mandy. There happens to be a severed hand in there. Mandy freaks. The lights go out. (Mandy's scared of the dark). Mandy really freaks. Mandy sense something in the darkness. There's a breath of cold air on her neck. Chass makes a dive for the knife drawer. Mandy feels something cold and sharp prick her. (Mandy has a serious phobia about sharp things). Mandy totally loses it. ("There are KNIVES in the DARKNESS!") She runs.

We had a nother smallish split here, I think, to cover what happened with Chass in the kitchen while Mandy fled.

There's a thud. Chass is still talking, but Bubba ain't. Mandy, running, trips over a body. It's Fred, he's dead, and he's missing a hand. Chass is chasing after her, making "say the wrong thing" rolls right and left:

<Chass> I wont hurt you! I swear!!
<Chass> Fred was an accident!
<Chass> Mandy! Stop running!
<Chass> This will all be over soon, I swear!

Mandy hightails it out of there, (another split) and runs into Jimmy. She's really glad to see him, cos she thinks Chass is an axe murderer (more or less). Then Jimmy says:

"I was afraid too, before I DIED".

And his eyes start to glow. Yellow.

So, Mandy runs back the other way yelling for Chass. She tries to dial 911 on her cell phone (it seems she managed to hang on to her purse all this time) but it's dead, so she throws it away.

So Mandy runs like crazy and finds herself in the ballroom, where there's an "approaching footseps" suspense scene. Ends up with Chass, Mandy, and Jimmy all arguing together. Jimmy is acting perfectly normal again.

Then there's an earthquake.

(Still don't know what that's all about.)

Then we hear the van start up and rev. We all charge outside to keep from getting stranded, but there's no van, just the lingering echo of the rev. No cars. No nothing. Not even any tracks.

The house door slams behind us. There's a light in the attic window (where we couldn't get the lights to work). The door opens again. Chass suggests beating it for warmer climates. Then Bubba yells from inside ("Get off me you disco freak." Still don't know what that's about either.)

Anyway, Adam comes out of the woods, only he's all freaky now. (Turns out that it was Adam chasing Mandy in the ballroom after she ran away from Jimmy. He's given away by his limp.)

Jimmy goes for the gate, but he can't get it open, so he escapes over the wall instead. Chass and Mandy go after him, but Mandy remembers Bubba is inside, and insists on going back. She also thinks that the wall is a trap, because she doesn't believe that Jimmy is human. So Chass makes a break for the wall, and Mandy goes back inside. Big split here. A bit later I hear a scream from Chass, but I still don't know what happened. :)

Anyway, Mandy heads for the attic, where the light was, and bounces off Biff. He looks scared and asks if she's real. Mandy kisses him to explain that she is. They head upstairs together. Biff reveals that he knocked out Nate. He claims self defense. "He was trying to kill me with a knife! Yeah, he was all bloody."

So we get to the top of the stairs. The door is glowing. We go through into a sort of occult lab, complete with hooded figure stiring a pot, lots of mystic symbols, a necronomicon, big candles, body parts hanging on the wall awaiting the pot, etc. Mandy grabs the hood and pulls it back, but there's nothing underneath. Gloved hands stir the pot, but the cloak is empty!

Mandy freaks again and backs into Biff. He laughs and asks her if he wants a taste. Then his eyes start glowing. Nate's head bubbles up to the top of the pot.

Snappy dialogue follows, on the order of "Where's Chass?" "He's joining the flock, as will you, prettykins!"

Mandy makes a really bad Star Wars quote (It was about 4:00 AM by this time) and breaks for the door. She gets past Biff and races down the stairs. She finds herself in the ballroom where Bubba is asking "Hey, is that really you Chass?"

Much dialogue follows in which both Bubba and Chass try to convince Mandy the other is not human. Chass loses when his eyes start glowing, and Bubba and Mandy make for the door. They go through... they're back in the attic magilab! Mandy loses it completely. In the words of Chris, "her mind is el toast." Bubba is quite resourceful, though. Being superstitious, and holding a great respect for his own well being, he drags Mandy out into the ballroom again, having the presence of mind to first grab the necronomicon and take it with him ("Hey, I bet they need this!").

And here's the wrap-up. :)

<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> You never understood what happened
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> or where they took you
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> You can't get out of the place with the four white walls and padding on the ceiling and walls
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> Some people called you lucky to survive
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> Some thinks that maybe you would have been luckier if you had vanished just like the rest.
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> Most of the days you just sit there, staring at nothing.
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> But sometimes, especially at night time, you sometimes start to speak.
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> In a low voice so people can't quite hear, but some swear you are saying something like "come with me, Chass come with me"
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> And when you do that, if they were looking very closely, they would see your eyes turns a little golden.
<HorrorMaster_PaleFire> The End

What I'm really interested in is, what happened to Bubba?

Pale Fire wrote:
Any comments on the pacing on the story, Nathan and Chris? I like to build up a "everything is just peachy and ordinary" at the start to make the contrast bigger (all that is mentioned in the rules by the way). Did you too feel that was a good thing?

I liked it a lot. I really enjoyed the beginning where we were just playing more or less "slice of life" with nothing freaky. Just knowing that it was likely to get scary, and the odd spooky clue (missing parents, cell phone in fridge) gave it some tension and a lot of flavor. When do we do the prequel / sequel? I Want To Believe!

;)

I enjoyed the game a great deal. Most of the credit goes to Christoffer for his excellent GMing. I knew going in that poor Charles Dovermyer was going to be toast. What differed from my other horror gaming experiences was that at one point, very near the time of Charles's demise, I actually had hope that the poor kid just might get away.

Chass eventually tries to stop the bleeding using Nate's Dad's bathrobe belt.

Yeah. So for the rest of the game whenever Chass had to run (which was very often) he looked like a knife-wielding streaker.

C. Edwards wrote: I enjoyed the game a great deal. Most of the credit goes to Christoffer for his excellent GMing. I knew going in that poor Charles Dovermyer was going to be toast. What differed from my other horror gaming experiences was that at one point, very near the time of Charles's demise, I actually had hope that the poor kid just might get away.

Hah, I had a similar experience, but in reverse. (There was no way I was going to let the little slut escape! ;) At one point I had decided that Mandy was going to do the love-sick "I don't wanna live without you!" scene, and throw herself on the Chass-thing, accepting her fate. But Bubba, the cold voice of reason, swayed her squashed psyche towards escape. To quote Horror Master Yoda: "Then Matters Were Worse!"