Season of the Witch: Episode 6

Episode 6: Deep in the Heart

Fall 2004
San Antonio, Texas.

Willow and Tara encounter a young Native-American woman (Lisa) possessed by the ghost of dead shaman. The ghost, a buu-kha, is stronger than other ghosts they have encountered before. It can effect physical objects and normal people. Magical people and the Iquanni can see it.
The girls attack it, but magic only makes it stronger. They scry for it (more Charmed influences) and finally learn that they can trap it in a “soul jar”.
The Iquanni do not trust the cast and they do not want to help Lisa.
Finally they get a soul jar, Willow and Tara perform the ritual and Bob fights the buu-kha.
They trap the ghost, but the damage to Lisa’s soul was too much and she dies.

NOTES: This was a fast one. This adventure was actually the first one written for the old “Road Stories” season and it does have a different feel than some of the others. DitH was also written by my friend Kirk Baldridge, who is not a gamer but a writer. He has credits in “Slayer’s Handbook”, “Magic Box” and “Ghosts of Albion” as a playtester and was instrumental in “The Dragon and the Phoenix”.
Deep in the Heart is more Willow focused, even if it is less “arc” focused. The Buu-kha is a new creature that later gave me ideas for Oblis in Ghosts. The Iquanni are a made up tribe, so we didn’t have to worry about making mistakes about a real native American tribe and allowed us some freedom.
As per other adventures I stole from a lot of books. This one had some White Wolf new World of Darkness stuff in it, or least the little I could learn from the web at the time. I also used some GURPS (as I had in “Under a Cajun Moon”) but GURPS has no soul and there was very little I could grab there in terms of style. GURPS Horror though was a good read for this.
Lisa does die in the end. Now it is well known I don’t like to kill characters, including NPCs. But this is dangerous stuff and Kirk wanted the players to be reminded that there are innocents out there and they can get hurt. Lisa was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
There are some nice scenes here though. Willow and Tara buy cowboy hats and boots. We did a quick mention about Dark Magic and that was it.

Next Time: Everyone knows what happened in Roswell New Mexico.
Everyone is wrong.

Playing D&D with Kids, Part 3 New Old or Old New?

So I am going to chat with my regular DM this weekend (the start of our new Northlands game) and he has run tons of games for kids.

But I wanted to catch the opinion/pulse of all of you.

What "D&D" should I play?

I kinda want to run old Moldvay/Cook Basic/Expert to be honest.  I'd make the characters, and do a old timey dungeon crawl.  But truthfully other than my want there is no reason why is has to be B/X.

Should I run it as a newer Retro-Clone (something the kids can go buy)?  As D&D 4 (something they could buy and I know is fun for kids)? Or keep it as B/X?

Basic Fantasy is my current favorite retro-clone, but Labyrinth Lord runs a very close second.
Spellcraft and Swordplay is also a huge fave of mine for Original D&D feel, but I think for this I want to go with something in the Basic realm (which is why I am also not opting for OSRIC).

Thoughts?

Playing D&D with Kids Follow-up and Question

This is directed specifically to the parents of D&D playing kids.

What do you all think of a classic-style Dungeon Crawl that features a lot of undead, wolves and a big bad vampire to kill at the very end?

What would this be age-appropriate for?

My boys (ages 11 and 7) know all about zombies, vampires and werewolves and they know that if they defeat them then they will get their characters instead.

They are cool with it.  Have you ever run these horror tropes with young kids?

Playing D&D with Kids

There have been a lot of posts in the blogs and on the net about playing D&D with younger kids.

From WotC: http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4tut/kids2#73004
and this classic article, http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4news/april2010

Of course there is my kids' group, The DragonSlayers.

Well I am thinking about running some games at Gen Con for kids this year.

I am also thinking of using the Moldvay/Cook versions of Basic and Expert for it as well.    Nothing is set in stone yet, I am going to chat about it over the weekend with my regular group.  But this might be a chance a debut my long delayed "Return to the Cavern of the Vampire Queen" old school dungeon crawl.

At the moment to make it really old school I need to include more treasure.  There is not really enough of that.

Like Alexander, I weep...

My FLGS is having their next auction in March.  It is a great time to go and get some games that you didn't buy when they were new, buy games cheap or even pick up something you have never heard of before.

Last October I went to the auction and got some really awesome deals (see here and here).  The trouble is that my successes have been so good of late, both at the auctions and finding books online and at cons, that I have nothing I want to buy anymore.

Zip. Zilch.  Nothing.

I have hundreds of books, thousands of PDFs and who know how many printed out play-test documents.
If there is a game out there, chances are I have or didn't want it.

Sure I am missing a lot of Star Wars books, need more Traveler and could always expand my Star Frontiers library a bit.  But none of those are "needs" or even "wants" at this point.

So I sit on my mountain of books and weep over lands I can never conquer again.
Or something like that, till the next new thing excites me.

When is D&D 5 due out again? ;)

And you thought your High School had Drama

I just picked up two new games this weekend and I really like them both. "The Silver Kiss of the Magical Twilight of the Full Moon" and "Byron Falls". Both are short games and both are just 5 bucks, so for just a little cash you can get a couple of really fun games.

Both take the very ripe and ready genre of "High School Supernatural Romance" and run with it.  And yes I do mean things like "Twilight" and many other books and TV shows like "Vampire Diaries".  Set it all in some small town where the girls are super smart and beautiful, the boys are all emo and everyone is trying to date the local supernatural populace.

The hard core horror guy in me wants to rebel, saying that this is what is so wrong with the genre today.  That last generations monsters are this generations would be dates.  But in truth I just can't get worked up about it.  The games are fun, there is a bit of tongue in cheek here (ok, maybe more than a bit) and if these games can capture just a fraction of the "Teen Angst" market that sells the books and TV shows, then they will be the ones laughing at us hard core horror types. ;)

So what are these games?  Well if you have ever listened to a Smiths song, then that is what you have here.  Take those high school kids, mix in a supernatural and let wackiness ensue.  Both go for very rules-light presentations and instead focus on the relationships and interactions with the characters.    In fact the rules are so light that an enterprising GM could add these games to any current modern supernatural game (or even supers) for another level of play.

The Silver Kiss of the Magical Twilight of the Full Moon 

Silver Kiss, or SKMTFM in the book,  was the first one I picked up.
There are some very interesting things going on in this book too.  First I loved the idea of chocolate as XP, great thing to do and something I have used with younger kids too.  The game assumes four players; two humans and two supernaturals.   The stats are very simple and include names like "Emo" and "Bad Ass".  You get some points to redistribute, so you can have a high "Pretty" and a lower "Emo" for example.  The supernaturals get to choose their race and what they can do is agreed on by the group.  So vampires can walk around in sunlight or faeries can't go into churches.  Then the first scene, or soon after that, one of the humans and one the supernaturals fall in love.  It is designed to be very fluid and fast.  When there is conflict a simple d6 resolution mechanic is given.  The idea here is not who could beat who in a fight, but rather what would be more dramatic and even angsty for the game?  For example if tonight is the big prom (and there is always something going on "tonight") then if two characters get into a fight (let's say the brooding vampire boy and the pining werewolf boy) then the winner will be the one that causes the most drama for our human girl.  She wants to take the vampire, but if the vampire beats the crap out of the werewolf then she will feel for the poor werewolf!  So much drama.  And that is what the game is all about and I think the author Jenni Dowsett does it very, very well.  The game includes tons of "Secret agendas" for the supernatural creatures.  Everything from the personal (X is already in a relationship with Y) or the global (You can't be with her because you are a Z).
My favorite though is a bunch of Emo Quotes that are cut up and given to players to use.  The only thing that is really missing is a rule on how to handle the "long meaningful stare".   The character sheets are easy to fill out.  I suggest printing out the book two page per sheet, that gives your characters sheets a nice portable size that you can fold over like a small journal or diary.  An appendix of recommended reading, watching and listening is included. The game ends with a Halloween themed episode/adventure.
The author also has an active blog where she is posting new ideas for her game all the time, http://jennitalula.wordpress.com/.

Byron Falls
Byron Falls works in a similar manner.

Written by RPG demi-god John Wick Byron Falls focuses more on the human side of the equation.  The town of Byron Falls is full of beautiful, highly intelligent girls and women that only have eyes for the supernatural creatures in town.  And the town has more than their fair share.  Character generation is also very simple.  You have Interests, up to five Friends, an Enemy (or not) and your Grade.  All characters start out as High School Freshman (Grade 9).  The mechanic is a very simple one.  If you want to do something and it relevant to your interests or friends then you roll the number of dice that you have points in that area. Evens mean a success.  No success and your enemy gets to decide what the outcome of your actions are.  Again here it is not whether or not you have enough points in a area to beat someone up, but rather what is most dramatic for the game.  The supernatural creatures of BF also have to be agreed on.  Do Werewolves and Vampires hate each other? How do witches react around humans?
The game is designed with playing humans in mind, and female high schoolers in particular.  But over time more supernaturals can be added and even some characters may discover they are supernatural themselves (like becoming a witch on your 16th birthday).
The town is fleshed out and situations are given for role-playing.

Both games simultaneously poke fun at and respect their source material, which I think is about right.  They can see the silly side of this but at the same time understand that to the people in this situation it is all seriousness.  It is high school, where all drama in Big Drama and every choice is Life and Death.

If you are fan of the source material then these games will be fun.  If you are not a fan then these games can also still be a lot of fun if taken in the right mindset.

Games for Games Sake

OR: "How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Game"

Following up on a series of posts that basically have been asking, "Why aren't Games Better".

This morning I read this from Amber Benson's blog, Art for Art's Sake.
Amber is a multi-talented actor, writer, director, singer, dancer and even RPG author (she did write the adventure "Almasti" in the Ghosts of Albion Core book) and she is reflecting on the lack of good opportunities for many actors in today's world and how she has decided not to let that get to her and she will instead only take the jobs that please her as an artist.

I think that is great advice and one that can be extended to the whole RPG biz and the OSR in particular.

I am very fortunate. I don't have to write games to pay my bills.  I can write what I want or take the odd for hire writing gig or more often than not, reject others that while would be nice to get paid for, I don't have the love for them.

So I have decided to take all games on face value.  The questions I'll ask begin and end with "is it fun for me?", everything else is only details.

When writing something now, unless it is a for pay gig, then I am working from the point of view of "is it fun for me?"  IF other find it fun then great! If not, then that's ok too.  I am not trying to be elitist here, actually just the opposite, since I believe that if I find it fun to write and play so will others and hopefully that means a better product.

There are plenty of people out there that need to write to put food on the table, or keep the bills paid off for at least one more month.  For them, since I can't say my laid back attitude would help them or not, I just promise to stay out of the way.  If you are doing something I like and find fun then be assured I'll tell people.  If I don't like it, well then I might not know enough to tell anyone anything about good or bad.  But if I do, then be assured I'll give you a good, intelligent reason why I don't like it.  Your job then is to listen to me or ignore me as it benefits your enjoyment of your game.

The truth is there is just too much good stuff out there to worry about the games that don't work for me.