Once again there were missing players, this time Aramandia, The Sleeping One, and The Great Migrant. We had two more rounds of the Second Age so that everyone could finish up their business with it, and then finally moved onto the Third.
Highlights:
-9 armies of the Dead sent by Visour form around the Sandmyn city of Blade Point. The living within are worried and send a representative to liaise with them. The Dead demand control of the city and, more importantly, the gate to The Keeping Place (realm of The Grave Keeper and prison for evil souls) within. The living refuse this, and flee the city in their airships, but not before sealing the gate with powerful magic. In frustration the Dead destroy the city and salt its oasis. The Grave Keeper sends a sandstorm in revenge, and obliterates all the Dead. The Grave Keeper also decides that Visour will no longer judge the souls of those who lived, instead Aramandia, The Grave Keeper, and Soraka will judge the souls together. The refugees decide to create a floating city held aloft by magic and their knowledge of aerodynamics. The news of the Dead armies spreads and many other civilizations begin arming themselves, including a defense pact between the Treemyn (humans that live in the woods) and the Ulver (tree climbing wolves).
-The Githkin and Viashino officially become a united civilization. This leads to some intermarriage and the Giathkino mixed people appear. Many are persecuted and killed. Visour sends the Dead armies to crush the city (Plantation) where most of the murders are occurring. Githkin armies come from another city (Spear) in defense of Plantation. A great battle ensues with the Githkin eventually losing. Visour gives the city to the Giathkino who rename it Kindred.
-While the armies of Spear are away, a bitter Viashino warlord captures the city. The Githkin grand general heads to the city with overwhelming force. The Viashino flatten the city and kill all of the inhabitants, then flee back to their mountains. The Githkin pursue them, and end up routing them despite a hard fought battle.
-The Mer (fish/frog people) meet the Ulver and learn ocean navigation from them. They then use this knowledge to sail down the river that splits the continent Ulveron. They encounter the Xungi (sentient fungus) and together create organic power armour for the Mer.
I want to have only one more session because they world does not need to be sorted out before we start RPing in it. There is so much going on that any number of story seeds could be sown.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Sunday, May 23, 2010
More Second Age
After a break last week we continued on with the Age of Heroes. However, two players were missing, and one arrived late and had to leave early. Thus, the only constant gods were Talamour, Visour, The Sleeping One, Sorakka, and The Grave Keeper, while Aramandia made an appearance.
Surprisingly even though there were two players missing we got through fewer turns than we did in the previous session when everyone was present. This wasn't bad though because the cause was a great deal of role playing between players.
Again we stayed within the second age. I had been hoping to move to the third age or at least get close because I am itching to start planning for the campaign even though I am having fun. Part of that fun was being able to enact the majority of the things I had been planning for awhile including destroying the telepathic internet of the Githkin.
This session's highlights:
-The cold war between the Githkin (long armed telepathic dwarves) and the Viashino (lizardmen) grows with an arms race. Eventually it comes to a head when The Grave Keeper has an earthquake make the Viashino lands in the mountains unsafe, and destroys the giant wall that separated the Githkin and the Viashino. However, the Githkin and Viashino do not go to war, and instead many Viashino settle in the Southern parts of their shared continent, while the Githkin remain in the central area.
-The Orcana (drunken gambling whale people) city of Casino rises from the water due to stored energy within it and begins to float amongst the magnetic storms of that area of the ocean. The Orcana that were trapped eventually change into humanoid whales with battery organs in place of dorsal fins, and they rename the city Casinon. They then regain their lost knowledge of electrical engineering.
-Some Mer (frog people) climb up the giant tree Hybrassil and begin looking for a seed. They decide that the seeds are likely within the bodies of the Pixies who live in the tree's branches, and begin vivisecting them. They eventually find a seed, but the seed's pollen causes beautiful flowers to burst forth from their chests killing them. Eventually they adapt and the flowers no longer burst forth fatally but wait until the Mer have died.
-An avatar appears amongst the Marungus (economically knowledgeable psychic octopus people) and begins using his economic power to benefit himself. He creates a secret cabal of manipulators and a personal army. The Sleeping One is not amused and curses the avatar to hear all speech as gibberish and anyone he psychically touches looses the ability to speak comprehensibly as well. However, he works around this and starts issuing orders in writing, and begins to spread the influence of his cabal amongst other races.
-The meteorite sent down by Xasthura, and colonized by the Sandmyn (desert dwelling humans), rises as an avatar of the Grave Keeper with the city of Sky's Bounty resting on his shoulders. Tomb That Walks heads West creating the Step Lakes in the plains and the Glass Road in the desert. The sight of him inspires some Zet (palm sized sentient sand fleas) to train themselves to be bigger and stronger. These Zet eventually grow to 5 feet tall and cal themselves Unzut. However, the Zet outnumber them and soon enslave the Unzut for hard labour.
Hopefully next session will see us moving on to the third age. The second age is supposed to be about developing the civilizations, and the third is about interactions, but the interactions always seem to start in the second. We should move on.
Surprisingly even though there were two players missing we got through fewer turns than we did in the previous session when everyone was present. This wasn't bad though because the cause was a great deal of role playing between players.
Again we stayed within the second age. I had been hoping to move to the third age or at least get close because I am itching to start planning for the campaign even though I am having fun. Part of that fun was being able to enact the majority of the things I had been planning for awhile including destroying the telepathic internet of the Githkin.
This session's highlights:
-The cold war between the Githkin (long armed telepathic dwarves) and the Viashino (lizardmen) grows with an arms race. Eventually it comes to a head when The Grave Keeper has an earthquake make the Viashino lands in the mountains unsafe, and destroys the giant wall that separated the Githkin and the Viashino. However, the Githkin and Viashino do not go to war, and instead many Viashino settle in the Southern parts of their shared continent, while the Githkin remain in the central area.
-The Orcana (drunken gambling whale people) city of Casino rises from the water due to stored energy within it and begins to float amongst the magnetic storms of that area of the ocean. The Orcana that were trapped eventually change into humanoid whales with battery organs in place of dorsal fins, and they rename the city Casinon. They then regain their lost knowledge of electrical engineering.
-Some Mer (frog people) climb up the giant tree Hybrassil and begin looking for a seed. They decide that the seeds are likely within the bodies of the Pixies who live in the tree's branches, and begin vivisecting them. They eventually find a seed, but the seed's pollen causes beautiful flowers to burst forth from their chests killing them. Eventually they adapt and the flowers no longer burst forth fatally but wait until the Mer have died.
-An avatar appears amongst the Marungus (economically knowledgeable psychic octopus people) and begins using his economic power to benefit himself. He creates a secret cabal of manipulators and a personal army. The Sleeping One is not amused and curses the avatar to hear all speech as gibberish and anyone he psychically touches looses the ability to speak comprehensibly as well. However, he works around this and starts issuing orders in writing, and begins to spread the influence of his cabal amongst other races.
-The meteorite sent down by Xasthura, and colonized by the Sandmyn (desert dwelling humans), rises as an avatar of the Grave Keeper with the city of Sky's Bounty resting on his shoulders. Tomb That Walks heads West creating the Step Lakes in the plains and the Glass Road in the desert. The sight of him inspires some Zet (palm sized sentient sand fleas) to train themselves to be bigger and stronger. These Zet eventually grow to 5 feet tall and cal themselves Unzut. However, the Zet outnumber them and soon enslave the Unzut for hard labour.
Hopefully next session will see us moving on to the third age. The second age is supposed to be about developing the civilizations, and the third is about interactions, but the interactions always seem to start in the second. We should move on.
Friday, May 14, 2010
Music and Role Playing
Using music during a session is one of the easiest ways of adding atmosphere to a session. Many people think about it or try it, but it doesn't work for everyone. The biggest problem is breaking the immersion of the game. When you go to see a movie, chances are you don't notice the music, but you can feel it's effect on the movie. Usually the music only becomes apparent when the director wants the audience to pay attention to it, and associate it with something, for instance The Imperial March.
Admittedly I'm still learning how to use music in my sessions, but I have picked up a couple rules.
1) DON'T use music that the players will recognize. It doesn't matter if you think it will fit, if even one of them will recognize it don't use it. This creates a small problem for picking music to use during sessions because if you want the music to be atmospheric the best places to find atmospheric music is in TV shows, movies, and video games. The obvious answer then is to use music from movies/TV shows/video games your players don't know or haven't heard. Youtube is a good resource for finding fitting music, just search for whatever kind of music you're looking for and try all the stuff that comes up.
2) DON'T use music with lyrics. This is related loosely to rule number 1) since (obviously) the vast majority of music is stuff that would be played on the radio (figuratively speaking) and thus, fairly well known. Additionally, if the lyrics are decipherable then the players may be distracted by trying to understand them. If the players are paying attention to the lyrics, they are paying less attention to the game.
3) DO try to create leitmotif. Leitmotif is the musical idea of associating a certain musical composition with a specific character, theme, situation, or place. The previously mentioned Imperial March is a perfect example, many people know it as Vader's Theme. There's also using leitmotif with a specific sound as opposed to a piece of music, such as the sound effects for lightsabers. To create leitmotif the GM must play the music/sound every time the character/situation/etc is "on screen" and perhaps a little louder the first time.
4) DO try to find the right volume for the music. This is tricky and depends on the group, the situation in game, the song, and the placement of the speakers. The music needs to be loud enough that it can be heard by everyone, but not so loud that it distracts from the game and breaks the immersion. If possible test it beforehand, but be prepared to adjust it throughout the session. Important to remember is that if you notice that everyone has gotten louder since the music has been put on that means they are talking over it, so don't turn the volume up if it can't be heard.
5) DON'T loop the music. The song should play once and be done with for that scene. It's ok to use it again later (particularly when using a leitmotif), but once per two scenes is probably plenty. Relatedly, if you use a playlist to sort your music, make sure to set it so that the playlist won't go to the next song on the list. I'd only make an exception to that if ALL the songs are fairly similar and would be less jarring without each other than the first one would be alone.
6) DON'T fiddle with the music player too much. The addition of music to the session should be as smooth as possible. Don't put the session on hold to adjust the volume, find the right song, or whatever. Keep your actions hidden. If the players notice you fooling about too much that'll distract them.
7) DO remember that you don't need music. It doesn't work for everyone, not everyone has the right equipment, and not everyone has the right ear for the music. Give it a try a couple times, ask your players what they thought of your use of the music, and if it doesn't work after the third or fourth time, leave it be.
Admittedly I'm still learning how to use music in my sessions, but I have picked up a couple rules.
1) DON'T use music that the players will recognize. It doesn't matter if you think it will fit, if even one of them will recognize it don't use it. This creates a small problem for picking music to use during sessions because if you want the music to be atmospheric the best places to find atmospheric music is in TV shows, movies, and video games. The obvious answer then is to use music from movies/TV shows/video games your players don't know or haven't heard. Youtube is a good resource for finding fitting music, just search for whatever kind of music you're looking for and try all the stuff that comes up.
2) DON'T use music with lyrics. This is related loosely to rule number 1) since (obviously) the vast majority of music is stuff that would be played on the radio (figuratively speaking) and thus, fairly well known. Additionally, if the lyrics are decipherable then the players may be distracted by trying to understand them. If the players are paying attention to the lyrics, they are paying less attention to the game.
3) DO try to create leitmotif. Leitmotif is the musical idea of associating a certain musical composition with a specific character, theme, situation, or place. The previously mentioned Imperial March is a perfect example, many people know it as Vader's Theme. There's also using leitmotif with a specific sound as opposed to a piece of music, such as the sound effects for lightsabers. To create leitmotif the GM must play the music/sound every time the character/situation/etc is "on screen" and perhaps a little louder the first time.
4) DO try to find the right volume for the music. This is tricky and depends on the group, the situation in game, the song, and the placement of the speakers. The music needs to be loud enough that it can be heard by everyone, but not so loud that it distracts from the game and breaks the immersion. If possible test it beforehand, but be prepared to adjust it throughout the session. Important to remember is that if you notice that everyone has gotten louder since the music has been put on that means they are talking over it, so don't turn the volume up if it can't be heard.
5) DON'T loop the music. The song should play once and be done with for that scene. It's ok to use it again later (particularly when using a leitmotif), but once per two scenes is probably plenty. Relatedly, if you use a playlist to sort your music, make sure to set it so that the playlist won't go to the next song on the list. I'd only make an exception to that if ALL the songs are fairly similar and would be less jarring without each other than the first one would be alone.
6) DON'T fiddle with the music player too much. The addition of music to the session should be as smooth as possible. Don't put the session on hold to adjust the volume, find the right song, or whatever. Keep your actions hidden. If the players notice you fooling about too much that'll distract them.
7) DO remember that you don't need music. It doesn't work for everyone, not everyone has the right equipment, and not everyone has the right ear for the music. Give it a try a couple times, ask your players what they thought of your use of the music, and if it doesn't work after the third or fourth time, leave it be.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Continuing the Age of Heroes
Super late post because I've been busy with life. ANYWAY.
We continued where we left off, two turns into the second age. We also added two new players, the previously missing one who is now The Sleeping One, and a new player who is playing The Great Migrant, god of pestilence, community, and vice.
We stayed within the Second Age this session, though we'll likely go to the third at the start of the next session. We only played 4 turns because the two added players slowed things done, plus everyone was getting more in character so there was a great deal of narration and RPing. This session went much better than the first.
Second Age Highlights:
-Visour creating sentient evil subraces of every race's walking dead. The Grave Keeper (myself) realizes she might be using souls that are supposed to go to him for this little project and gets pissed. However, it's talked out and the souls are new ones, not stolen from The Keeping Place nor Kaia. Still, why did the goddess of justice create a bunch of evil dead? Why is she gathering an evil dead avatar from each race on one particular island? I'm keeping an eye on them.
-The Great Migrant creates a race of whale like people that are obsessed with chance. They use games of chance to determine their position in life, though the ones in charge of the games remain in power because "the house always wins." The Orcana, as they are called, also can store electricity in their body but this in turn makes them inebriated. So there's a race of drunk lightning whales.
-The Sleeping One creates a giant writhing ball of tentacles in one of the few calm areas of water. This thing then spews forth good clairvoyant octopus men with a gift for economics. They eventually go out into the world to spread their knowledge.
-The Lizardmen and the long armed dwarves remain hostile with the conflict escalating. Soraka says that this is to make both races strong through war, Talamour says that they are strong IN war, but have no culture. He gives culture to the dwarves and they begin negotiations with the lizardmen. Soraka doesn't like this so he has the dwarves build a wall across their continent to keep out the lizard people. This leads to the only neutral city being built into the wall as a gate.
-The desert dwelling humans (who have a mastery of aerodynamics) notice that corpses create a gas that is lighter than air. They use this new found resource to create blimps. These corpse blimps are then used to explore further afield.
-The moon turns out to be an avatar of Xasthura, just like the sun. A piece falls off and crashes to the ground outside of a human town. The humans discover the meteorite has a forest and game animals, so they make a settlement atop it.
I'm looking forward to the next session, and I know everyone is scheming something. I certainly have my plans.
We continued where we left off, two turns into the second age. We also added two new players, the previously missing one who is now The Sleeping One, and a new player who is playing The Great Migrant, god of pestilence, community, and vice.
We stayed within the Second Age this session, though we'll likely go to the third at the start of the next session. We only played 4 turns because the two added players slowed things done, plus everyone was getting more in character so there was a great deal of narration and RPing. This session went much better than the first.
Second Age Highlights:
-Visour creating sentient evil subraces of every race's walking dead. The Grave Keeper (myself) realizes she might be using souls that are supposed to go to him for this little project and gets pissed. However, it's talked out and the souls are new ones, not stolen from The Keeping Place nor Kaia. Still, why did the goddess of justice create a bunch of evil dead? Why is she gathering an evil dead avatar from each race on one particular island? I'm keeping an eye on them.
-The Great Migrant creates a race of whale like people that are obsessed with chance. They use games of chance to determine their position in life, though the ones in charge of the games remain in power because "the house always wins." The Orcana, as they are called, also can store electricity in their body but this in turn makes them inebriated. So there's a race of drunk lightning whales.
-The Sleeping One creates a giant writhing ball of tentacles in one of the few calm areas of water. This thing then spews forth good clairvoyant octopus men with a gift for economics. They eventually go out into the world to spread their knowledge.
-The Lizardmen and the long armed dwarves remain hostile with the conflict escalating. Soraka says that this is to make both races strong through war, Talamour says that they are strong IN war, but have no culture. He gives culture to the dwarves and they begin negotiations with the lizardmen. Soraka doesn't like this so he has the dwarves build a wall across their continent to keep out the lizard people. This leads to the only neutral city being built into the wall as a gate.
-The desert dwelling humans (who have a mastery of aerodynamics) notice that corpses create a gas that is lighter than air. They use this new found resource to create blimps. These corpse blimps are then used to explore further afield.
-The moon turns out to be an avatar of Xasthura, just like the sun. A piece falls off and crashes to the ground outside of a human town. The humans discover the meteorite has a forest and game animals, so they make a settlement atop it.
I'm looking forward to the next session, and I know everyone is scheming something. I certainly have my plans.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Starting The Age of Heroes
I've finally started the Age of Heroes with my group. It's not the group I originally thought it would be, but it's been fun nonetheless. I didn't have the random domain draw that I originally planned, instead we took turns picking our domains. We didn't get through the entire setting creation process in one day however.
Dawn of Worlds is broken up into three ages. The first age is about creating the geography of the world by shaping land, terrain features, and climate. Other things such as creating races can be done, but they are discouraged through having a high point cost (each turn a player gets 3d6 points plus whatever they saved from the previous turn). The second age is about creating the races, and subraces. The third age is when the various civilizations are supposed to interact through technology, commerce, war, etc. Today, we had 3 rounds in the first age and 2 rounds in the second. Next weekend we will continue where we left off in the middle of the second age.
Here's some of the highlights.
The Pantheon:
Talamour – Change/Freedom/Chaos, Cities/Manufacturing, Lightning/Air
Aramandia – Love/Lust, Life/Healing, Glory/Hope
The Grave Keeper – Death, Luck/Fate/Trickery, Earth/Farming/Stone
Xasthura – Sun/Light, Moon/Darkness, Animals/Plants
Soraka – War/Tactics, Strength/Protection, Knowledge/Skill
Visour – Destruction/Murder, Fire/Hearth, Law/Resonsibility/Justice
The Sleeping One – Water/Ice/Sea, Wealth/Commerce/Greed, Travel/Commerce
There was supposed to be 6 players, but one of my friends woke up about 3 hours into the session due to a late night. Thus The Sleeping One became the god of leftover domains. I was playing The Grave Keeper.
First Age Highlights:
Lots of terrain building. Some of the more interesting terrains were geyser fields, magnetic storms, a giant tree growing out of the ocean, storm breathing sea serpents, an iceberg filled whirlpool, and several other terrifying bits of terrain. It became clear quickly that anyone interested in specializing in ships was going to have it rough.
The Grave Keeper made a realm where the evil souls go to be buried alive for eternity (with a pit in an oasis leading down to it), while Aramandia made a paradise like afterlife for the good souls. Visour made a judicial realm where said souls are judged. Soraka created a realm that was entirely an academy. The picture that Soraka's player drew to represent the realm looked like the gun space in The Matrix but with books. This lead to jokes about "Books. Lots of books." and "I know Calculus." Xasthura made the moon a realm that was also a paradise, and made the sun into an avatar.
Second Age Highlights:
Suddenly, race! Thousands of them. Most people had saved up a lot of points at the end of the first age because we weren't sure what else to do with them. So the first round saw the creation of 9 races and 1 subrace. The races were varied with a sentient fungus, tree wolves, evil sand fleas, evil fairies, mist people, mountain dwelling humans (the subrace being those that moved to the desert), short long-armed telepaths, lizardmen, and hairy humans that evolved from moles.
These races were accompanied by avatars (except the humans) and technological advancements. The mole people took up ship building and agriculture, the telepaths protected themselves from reptilian raiders, and the fleas learned gymnastics.
Things really started to get interesting towards the end when Xasthura created a 500 year long solar eclipse while the desert dwelling humans build a fortress around the gate to the underworld. The reasoning being that they saw how balanced life and death were and decided to protect that balance while worshiping Aramandia and The Grave Keeper. Since they were the only ones worshiping The Grave Keeper, I created an event where the dead would rise from their graves to kill the living and let them know of the Grave Keeper. This happened right at the end of the game so the fallout from the walking dead appearing after the eclipse should be interesting.
So far everything has gone wonderfully (aside from my one friend not showing up) and I can't wait to finish and start RPing in the setting.
EDIT: I spoke with one of my players who is the resident expert on Dawn of Worlds. He said he was feeling fatigued from playing which never happens to him and he couldn't figure out why until later. He realized that until the very end there was no motivation behind the actions of the gods. All the terrain created was stuff that was either "needed" (such as rivers), or "cool" (like the magnetic storms). We were playing it as players rather than the gods we were supposed to be. I agree with his diagnosis. I think if I mention this next session this will be remedied.
Dawn of Worlds is broken up into three ages. The first age is about creating the geography of the world by shaping land, terrain features, and climate. Other things such as creating races can be done, but they are discouraged through having a high point cost (each turn a player gets 3d6 points plus whatever they saved from the previous turn). The second age is about creating the races, and subraces. The third age is when the various civilizations are supposed to interact through technology, commerce, war, etc. Today, we had 3 rounds in the first age and 2 rounds in the second. Next weekend we will continue where we left off in the middle of the second age.
Here's some of the highlights.
The Pantheon:
Talamour – Change/Freedom/Chaos, Cities/Manufacturing, Lightning/Air
Aramandia – Love/Lust, Life/Healing, Glory/Hope
The Grave Keeper – Death, Luck/Fate/Trickery, Earth/Farming/Stone
Xasthura – Sun/Light, Moon/Darkness, Animals/Plants
Soraka – War/Tactics, Strength/Protection, Knowledge/Skill
Visour – Destruction/Murder, Fire/Hearth, Law/Resonsibility/Justice
The Sleeping One – Water/Ice/Sea, Wealth/Commerce/Greed, Travel/Commerce
There was supposed to be 6 players, but one of my friends woke up about 3 hours into the session due to a late night. Thus The Sleeping One became the god of leftover domains. I was playing The Grave Keeper.
First Age Highlights:
Lots of terrain building. Some of the more interesting terrains were geyser fields, magnetic storms, a giant tree growing out of the ocean, storm breathing sea serpents, an iceberg filled whirlpool, and several other terrifying bits of terrain. It became clear quickly that anyone interested in specializing in ships was going to have it rough.
The Grave Keeper made a realm where the evil souls go to be buried alive for eternity (with a pit in an oasis leading down to it), while Aramandia made a paradise like afterlife for the good souls. Visour made a judicial realm where said souls are judged. Soraka created a realm that was entirely an academy. The picture that Soraka's player drew to represent the realm looked like the gun space in The Matrix but with books. This lead to jokes about "Books. Lots of books." and "I know Calculus." Xasthura made the moon a realm that was also a paradise, and made the sun into an avatar.
Second Age Highlights:
Suddenly, race! Thousands of them. Most people had saved up a lot of points at the end of the first age because we weren't sure what else to do with them. So the first round saw the creation of 9 races and 1 subrace. The races were varied with a sentient fungus, tree wolves, evil sand fleas, evil fairies, mist people, mountain dwelling humans (the subrace being those that moved to the desert), short long-armed telepaths, lizardmen, and hairy humans that evolved from moles.
These races were accompanied by avatars (except the humans) and technological advancements. The mole people took up ship building and agriculture, the telepaths protected themselves from reptilian raiders, and the fleas learned gymnastics.
Things really started to get interesting towards the end when Xasthura created a 500 year long solar eclipse while the desert dwelling humans build a fortress around the gate to the underworld. The reasoning being that they saw how balanced life and death were and decided to protect that balance while worshiping Aramandia and The Grave Keeper. Since they were the only ones worshiping The Grave Keeper, I created an event where the dead would rise from their graves to kill the living and let them know of the Grave Keeper. This happened right at the end of the game so the fallout from the walking dead appearing after the eclipse should be interesting.
So far everything has gone wonderfully (aside from my one friend not showing up) and I can't wait to finish and start RPing in the setting.
EDIT: I spoke with one of my players who is the resident expert on Dawn of Worlds. He said he was feeling fatigued from playing which never happens to him and he couldn't figure out why until later. He realized that until the very end there was no motivation behind the actions of the gods. All the terrain created was stuff that was either "needed" (such as rivers), or "cool" (like the magnetic storms). We were playing it as players rather than the gods we were supposed to be. I agree with his diagnosis. I think if I mention this next session this will be remedied.
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