Hullo, folks,
As noted in this thread,
viewtopic.php?f=22&t=409, I ran two
Desolation RPG scenarios this past weekend at CanGames, 2011 in Ottawa. What follows are the two separate posts about the running of the games. Please note that there are SPOILER WARNINGS for the scenario below, so read the rest of the post at your own risk.
The first of the two scenarios that I ran was one that the folks at Greymalkin Designs have run at conventions over the last couple (?) of years, iirc, called "Dead or Alive". This scenario ran on Friday, May 20th, from 7:00 - 11:00 pm. Due to my severe case of sciatica, the biggest mistake I made this year at CanGames for the
Desolation games was that I shouldn't have taken the fancy case that I keep the Style Chips in, as it weighed quite a bit. I had three players registered for the game, so when the sign-up sheet was put out half an hour before game time, I went over, sore back and leg and all, and started recruiting a few gamers to play in the game. Two other people had pre-registered for the game, so I only needed to recruit one other, which I did, and my friend, SRoss, decided to play in the game, filling up the seventh character slot. While I'm not going to go into details about the plot of "Dead or Alive", since the scenario is being run at conventions and the like still by the folks from Greymalkin Designs, the adventure took a turn into left field, and I had to improvise part of the ending of the adventure, although I fortunately had the alternate location written up so had some guidelines on how to handle it.
There was some interesting stuff during this game. For starters, other than SRoss and Doug (the new gamer in my Sunday gaming group), the other five players were all newbies to
Desolation. I was pleased that they found the game rules easy to learn, and the world one that was interesting to play in, and from what they said when the game was over, they had a very good time with it. Since all seven characters - Menelaris Covalanar, Tarl Ishrak, Krek of Kharhut, Denner Khent, Esther LaVore, Lem Ollender, and Sasha Veng - were in play, the game offered the promise of a terrific roleplaying session, but that wasn't exactly what I got. With an all-male player group of seven, it made things interesting to see two of the guys playing Sasha Veng, the Rover entertainer, and Esther LaVore, the noble sorceress. The fellow playing Esther LaVore did so with a high falsetto voice all night long, giving the other players fits of laughter at times. Priceless. He did a good job of playing off the Lem Ollender character, and the two of them interacted really well.
The fellow playing Lem Ollender, the Legionnaire, did a really good job of roleplaying the character, handling the leadership of the party (since the fellow playing Esther took a slightly less active role), and he kept the rest of the player characters focused on what they were supposed to be doing. He also did a marvellous job keeping the guy playing the elf, Menelaris Covalanar, in check and under control. Speaking of which, the fellow playing Menelaris actually came up with an interesting variation on the character, making him likeable. After all, Menelaris should be dead three times over - he's an Elf, he's a spellcaster, and he's condescending.
He also really went to town with the magic; he was suffering from some sort of Burn damage for most of the evening, and I thought he gave Menelaris an almost gay quality in his tone and voice while playing the character.
The two players who played Menelaris and Esther did a great job of handling magic in the game, and got quite creative - levitating and then flying over a field of bones, casting an earth and dust whirlwind at the villain of the piece, etc. - which can be quite difficult with the
Desolation magic system, given the free-form nature of the spell system. They both told me they didn't like the Burn business, but admitted that it fit the game really well.
The fellow playing Tarl Ishrak, the farmer with faith, did a marvellous job emphasising the religious elements of the Two Above, and worked a lot with his Blessing and True Faith abilities. I thought that he was marvellous in the manner in which he played the character, and he told me when the game ended that he really enjoyed the religious aspects and elements of the game and his character, and that the style and feel of it made for a nice change from the clerical types of priestly folk found in other fantasy rpgs.
Several notable things occurred. Krek of Kharhut saved the day by attaching a rope to an arrow, firing the arrow at the villain, and then pulling on the rope, causing the villain to topple into the pool containing liquid blessed by the Two Above. At another point, the characters had to cross a field of bones, that started to animate. Several fun moments occurred during this sequence, with the player characters racing across it pell mell. Another memorable moment was SRoss, playing Sasha Veng, had to make an Acrobatics roll on 7 dice, to flip over the undead trying to attack him, and botched! I've never seen a roll with that many dice, where he rolled 2 reds and 3 whites, botch.
When the scenario was finished for the evening, the players commented that one of the things they really liked was the mist that was all-pervasive throughout the scenario, as it came across as suitably creepy, and almost redirected suspicion from the villagers and the Necromancer. All of the players stated that they had really enjoyed the game, and were quite surprised by the simplicity of the game mechanics, and the non-typical feel of the game world, even though it was "sort of" fantasy. There were several players who came into the
Desolation game from a D&D background, and rather enjoyed themselves, both in terms of the system (especially the free-form magic system), and the different feel of the game world. One of the other comments that was made about the game is that it was very distracting that I was using the HOLLOW EARTH EXPEDITION GM Screen to run
Desolation, and that it would be nice to have a GM Screen for the game that reflected what was being run at the table. How subtle do I have to make the hint now, Greymalkin folks?
Overall, the first session of
Desolation that I ran at CanGames 2011 was a rousing success, but had a bit less roleplaying than I would have liked. Part of that was due to the players being new to the system, and some not knowing the personalities of the elves, dwarves, mongrels, and so forth in the setting. One of the things that the newbies to the game loved was the Nutrition Value (NV) business, where one player commented that while it made sense in a survival, post-apocalyptic game, it also gave the game a more visceral feel at times. Many of the players said they liked the game enough to pick up a copy when they got a chance, and that they wouldn't hesitate to play the game next year at the convention. That's a very good sign, overall. And I'll gladly run
Desolation at CanGames 2012 and give it all the love that it richly deserves.
