GreatWolf wrote: And Origins 2001 was going fine until cumulative fatigue caught up with us. :-)

Okay, Emily. We'll tell you.

Let's see.

Place: Origins 2001, Open Gaming (the breezeway)

Time: Friday night, 9:30 p.m.

The Players: Myself (Seth Ben-Ezra) of Dark Omen Games
Jason Blair of Key 20 Publishing
Greg.... (Grr. I don't remember Greg's last name) of Key 20 Publishing
Ralph Mazza, now of Ramshead Publishing
Mike Holmes, now of Ramshead Publishing
Jeremy McCabe, normal gamer

Thursday night, Jeremy and I were exposed to an early playtest version of Universalis, which I thought was a success. I was working on 4 hours of sleep and had come off my first day of exhibiting in the dealers' hall. So, the fact that I was exhausted and still understood what was going on (and had fun!) was a definite bonus in my mind.

So, now it was my turn to show off my project.

Another day of exhibiting. A pleasant dinner with Gareth-Michael Skarka and the Jaffes. A demo of Junk. And then....Alyria!

Now, you need to understand that this was the year that Little Fears took Origins by storm. (At least, that's my perception of it.) So we all had Little Fears on the brain, particularly Jason, Greg, and myself.

We were also very, very tired. There is a mind-numbing sort of exhaustion that comes from exhibiting, and we were deep within it.

So the game began. We decided to set it in the Citadel, as I was most familiar with that part of the setting. We hashed out the basic storymap. Basically, it all centered around a cursed bag that was empowered by dragon power. Anytime someone

reaches into the bag, it will give him what he most desires. Of course, the bag's power corrupts the item that it gives to its owner, thus increasing the pain and suffering in the world. At the same time, it corrupts its "owner" so that he will not give up the bag.

Jason played Tock, a clockwork toymaker living in the Web. His work is technically illegal, as clockworks fall under the exclusive monopoly of the Keeper priests. He is now in possession of the bag and is trying to fight its temptation, with mixed success. Any clockwork toy that he has made with parts from the bag has turned on its owner and killed him. And, since the owners of these toys are usually children....

See? No escape from Little Fears.

Mike played Mammon, a sleazy merchant who acted as the middleman between Tock and the Citadel. He gets involved mostly by accident, if I recall.

Greg played Magog, a really, really big, strong, dumb guy who lives in the Web. He might be Misbegotten, although we never actually defined this. He is being used and abused by Mephisto. He also likes to play with dolls.

Ralph played a guard captain reporting to the Keeper Inquisition. (The character's name is escaping me.) He is investigating the contraband clockworks to discover their source.

Jeremy played Mephisto, a Keeper Inquisitor who is also a dragon cultist who is trying to corrupt both Magog and Tock.

Everything started off fairly well. One scene I remember quite well is when Mephisto sent Magog on a mission. He was supposed to climb to a shack near the top of the Web, kidnap the little girl who is there, and throw her from the Web. If Magog did this, Mephisto would give him a better doll than he currently had. So, Magog climbed to the top and found the shack. At this point, Jeremy took over narration, describing in loving detail this sweet, innocent girl that he found.

Magog picked up the girl. He looked at the girl. He looked at the doll. He looked at the girl. (Greg, of course, is miming all this. The rest of us are on the edge of our seats.) Finally, Magog made his choice.

And threw the doll from the top of the Web.

The girl would be his new doll.

It was a great scene.

However, exhaustion was beginning to set into the players. We were all getting increasingly silly. Then, the dam broke.

Mephisto wanted to know if Magog had done his job. So he projected himself into Magog's sleeping mind. Greg started talking about Magog, dreaming that he was skipping through a field of flowers. Suddenly, a dark figure appears. "Magog!" Mephisto intones.

"Urg?" Magog said, shaking his head in confusion. For some reason, we all thought that this was quite funny.

Then Jeremy took it one step further. He stood up and demonstrated what must have happened. Mephisto appears. "Magog!" he intones. Then "Whoa!" and falls over as the "ground" shakes from Magog's shaking his head.

The image of the dark sorcerer falling over was too much. We burst out laughing. Greg was laughing so hard that he actually fell off his chair. I distinctly remember two gamers at a nearby table eyeing us suspiciously. "They're having too much fun," one said to the other. I think that it is an honor to have been able to weird out a gamer.

After we started breathing again, we agreed that the moment was lost and that we needed to wrap up the game.

Still, I like the idea of the bag. Mike still references it when he talks about Alyria, and I'll probably put together a storymap for con demoes based around the bag. It's too good an idea to let go.

And, credit where credit is due, the evil bag was Ralph's idea. It started as a joke, but it was easily the best thing to come out of that session.

By now, you may think that we're all crazy. All I can say is, "You had to be there."

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

I perhaps, was the one person there who was well into my second wind and could have gleefully continued to play for several more hours unlike these gaming amateurs (am I the only one who remembers 4 days at a con meant 4 hours of sleep max...? I distinctly remember playing till 6AM then starting the next day at 8AM being SOP...anyway).

The "moment was lost" stuff is pure nonsense. There was no moment lost. There was a bunch of babies who wanted to go to bed ;-)

Seriously, the combined brainstorming of very tired and very wired people was really assembling a pretty kick ass story...even at the end it wasn't really silly so much as it was surreal and demented.

Valamir wrote: Seriously, the combined brainstorming of very tired and very wired people was really assembling a pretty kick ass story...even at the end it wasn't really silly so much as it was surreal and demented.

Mike Holmes wrote:
So when we gonna pick it up again?

Well, wow.

The thing I find most amazing about Alyria is that it conveys a mood so well. Every account of Alyria play unfailingly seems to have this stormy intensity about it. So, keep the Actual Play comin', folks!

four willows weeping wrote: Well, wow.

The thing I find most amazing about Alyria is that it conveys a mood so well. Every account of Alyria play unfailingly seems to have this stormy intensity about it. So, keep the Actual Play comin', folks!

I want to run one myself, sometime; I'll write up my own experiences with that when I do. That'll probably be around the vicinity of Christmas break, round the time that Torchbearer gets moving too. It'll be an interesting interplay - the one thing I tried hardest to create in TB was texture.

I do think, though, that you've done a lot with the mechanics to prevent breaking of mood. It's up to the players to create it, but the game doesn't get in the way.

Greg's last name is Oliver.


Just fillin' in a blank, people.