Reflections on Metatopia 2015

It's currently wednesday as I write this, that may change when I post this. First of all, for the four or five of you that actually do read this blog, I'm sorry for the gap between posts. Work, Freelance Work, Imaginary Work and a dozen other things took over my life. There's also the fact that I'm not larping once a month any more, which lessens how often I get to think about things and ruminate. However, now that Metatopia is done, I have a few things to share with you all.

Going to Metatopia as a game designer for the first time was nerve racking to me. It was kind of funny to sit down and notice the panic attacks the days before. They were regularly scheduled and pretty much anticipated. I was presenting a game for the first time, I was going to be on a panel for the first time in a very long time. 

The first thing I recall from the convention was that this was really the first time that I was constantly doing stuff. Whether it was running around to prep for my panel, or for my game, or just talking to people, I was doing something. Normally at these conventions I have a few hours between events to rest and recharge. I didn't have that here, and I was surprised to find that I didn't need it as much either. Getting home, however, proved to be a lesson in paying up on my sleep debt. In many ways, I still am. 

As I said, I went to present Kensei as a game concept in a Focus Group. It wasn't a playtest, but a stress test for information to make sure the game was feasible. As a Character vs Character boffer larp tournament, I wanted to make sure that the game was feasible and that there was a market for it beyond stick jockeys thwacking each other (that's going to happen, I just want to know other people were interested in it as well). I had two slots. The friday morning slot went about as well as one thought: it was pretty much empty for the most part. It was friday morning, people either hadn't shown up or were still zonked out from travelling or networking the night before. I spent that time writing notes of my own, figuring at the very least I could get some work done on Kensei

Someone did eventually show up, game designer and academic Evan Torner. We talked casually for a while, mostly on Living Games Conference (where we had met a year and a half previously) as well as his recent run of Just a Little Loving, a Nordic Larp set in the early 80's and focused on the LGBT community during the initial outbreak of AIDS. We also spoke of the upcoming run of New World Magischola, a Nordic Larp inspired by the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and run in a similar fashion as College of Wizardry. 

We did, eventually, talk Kensei. The setting was fascinating. The setting was, of course, all I had. He gave me advice on how to start fashioning the mechanics to create the game I wanted: focus on what the theme was. If the theme of the game was the community forming around these fights, then the mechanics should be centered around that. That sounds so simple, but it was something that I wasn't grokking on at all while building this game.

To sum up the experience, here is an excerpt from a conversation I had with my friend Josh:

Josh: So how'd it go?

Craig: Not bad, only one person came in to look at the game. 

Josh: Who was it?
Craig: Evan Torner

Josh: So five people came in to look at Kensei, good.

The next day was more populated, with players I know from Dresden and from DR. One person was a practitioner of Aikido, Kenjutsu and Iaido. I made noises like a seal because I could sit and talk a different kind of shop with them for a few moments. In the end, they gave me a really great place to move on to next in developing the game, and solved a major problem I had fixed myself in to. That being said, people want to play this game, and I think I can make it.

This game is going to get made. 

I also took part in my first panel at a Double Exposure convention. It focused on the use of Sanity Points in games to denote mental health. That's a whole conversation in and of itself and will get a blog post of its own in the near future. The panel consisted of myself, Elsa Henry, Kelly Osborne, and Will Hindmarch. It shows how new I am to gaming and the gaming community when I recognized Will's name but couldn't put my finger on where I knew it. Then Elsa announced his contributions to White Wolf, especially in the writing of Mage the Awakening. 

For those of you keeping score at home, why yes, I'm a fan of Mage the Awakening. It is my favorite setting in the New World of Darkness line, even if it did drive me to drink after a while. So to have Will next to me was kind of a high note. I thanked him for Mage after the panel. The panel itself went beautifully, we could have been there for another hour and only just gotten in it. Signs point to a repeat next year.

The rest of the panel was playtesting. I tested a freeform larp called Waiting for Slenderman....which is as horrible and amazing as it sounds. The game was designed and run by KN Granger and Jacqueline Bryk. An hour or so in the dark while your character, who either thinks Slenderman is a hoax, real, or is neutral to the situation, is waiting for a promised appearance by Tall, Pale and Faceless itself. 

Another playtest was Nicholas Malinowski's tabletop game, Nementia. A steampunk world based on Welsh mythology? How could I resist. The game shows a lot of promise, and its a setting that I would dearly love to run a campaign for at some point. 

I also got to test Evil hat's Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game. The system was interesting, and since I suck out loud I'm going to leave it to Evil Hat to describe it better. What I can say is that the deck of character cards you get to play are amazingly in keeping with the characters themselves. I got to play a game where Harry Dresden, Michael Carpenter, Karrin Murphy, The Alphas, and Susan Rodriguez got to take on the Storm Front casefile. I got to play Michael, and it felt like I was able to play to the character's strengths and got to have a flavor for 'this is how he does it'. I'm looking forward to seeing how it develops. 

The rest of the convention was talking and chatting with people. I hit that point in my experience at these conventions where I don't always feel like a wallflower. Most of us talked about past experiences in previous clubs, while other conversations were about incoming video games. I also got in to a very passionate conversation about Star Wars (surprise!) and other conventions in the area. 

I also hit that point in my stay there were people assume I've been at these conventions or in the community a lot longer than I have. This is a talent I have no control over, and it happens every time. People assume I've always been in the community. Moments of mentioning someone I haven't met yet as if I would remember them. I know this isn't uncommon, but this happens a lot to me every time I go in to a new community. If I knew how to magically insert myself in to people's timelines, I'd have a much easier time.

The convention was not without its problems. Not to me, specifically, but there were stories of behavior that really didn't seem to jive with the attitude I had attributed to Metatopia. There were a few incidences of playtesters telling designers that there games should use an established system instead of building a new one. There was one incidence of a playtester telling a designer that they should go to the traderoom and buy all of the Fate games to fix their understanding of Fate Core. 

The prize winner, for me, was when one designer was told by one person that her game had no relevancy. To be clear, this game was a bout a sensitive topic in the world (I won't go in to specifics as I do not have permission to disclose). The dissenting tester went so far as to invoke his status as a "Southern Gentleman" to emphasize how little he felt her game was in any way relevant. The quotes are there because this was what was told to me. This is hearsay, but due to the climate of gaming

Let's get a few things straight, one: this was bullshit on the highest level. If it isn't your cup of tea to play, don't play it. No one person or group has the right to say what should and should not be presented. Secondly...a "Southern Gentleman"? Seriously? At what point was that actually relevant to the discussion? What criteria were they using? Normally, if a man is invoking his right as a Gentleman, then someone was entitled to challenging him to a duel for the insult he laid on this designer. It is such an absurd thing to say, made all the worse by the gatekeeping he was perpetrating at a convention where people are invited to develop and try new things. 

I think that was a point that some of the convention goers missed when they registered. Metatopia is, as far as I could tell, a place where designers and testers get together and try out new shit. Its not Metatopia where you drive the new hot car on to stage, its where you have the blue print for a hot new car and want others to look it over and test drive a model. It's an experimental jam session, where designers can tweak their games with the help of their peers and also to hang out and network with one another. It's informal, and there was a small rush of people who seemed to want to make it something a lot more.

But talking to the convention runners, that doesn't seem the case. Avie and Vinny are amazing people. That they were able to sit down with convention goers and talk over their input on the con--both things to fix and things to keep--is something refreshing. I never get the sense that we're just convention goers to them, they know us to one degree or another and are open to reception. 

Metatopia was a great experience for me, and one which I already look forward to having again next november. Hopefully by then, Kensei will be ready for testing. Goal set, see you there.


Later,

C

Final Fantasy VII Retrospective 'The Midgar Arc'

This is the first installment of my retrospective on Final Fantasy VII. FFVII had a very major impact on my gaming experience growing up. The concept of story and games was novel to me at the time (I was 11, sue me) and from that point on I was hooked. With the release of the game on to iOS, I felt I needed to give this game another go. This retrospective will cover things I noticed, and may not be entirely linear in its approach. This will NOT be a walkthrough, but a commentary on the game, my memories, and my hopes for the recently announced Remake and other projects. I will also, of course, discuss how this relates to us in roleplaying.

This entry will contain roughly the beginning portion of the game set in Midgar. Warning: This will contain spoilers of FFVII. If you have not played the game and don't want to know the score, please don't continue.

The game begins with everything running. Literally. You hope off of a train as the protagonist (Cloud Strife) in this dirty city surrounded by what look like industrial stacks. Your first action is to take out guards, and then advance onto one of the stacks which are actually high powered Reactors sucking natural energy into a refined energy called 'Mako'. This is killing the planet, and you're going to do something about it.

So, cool, you're here to save the world. You're doing awesome. You're....planting a bomb at the very heart of the reactor....uhm...guys....guys...? This one could go hard and to the--

Well, crap.

Going through the game, I was shocked at the notion that I was playing the part of an eco-terrorist whose first mission was essentially a bombing run on a nuclear reactor. If you look at that video, during the Reactor going full on Praxis, several explosions to the left of it occur. Those were houses. People were sleeping.

Congrats. Twenty minutes into the game and you've killed countless people in their sleep. Well fucking done.

The concept that, yes, you're a terrorist is brought up, but its done in a very broad sense. Cloud's a generally ambivalent about the whole thing, which makes it easier for the Players to make up their own mind. Barrett and his AVALANCHE squad of doofuses are too comical to be taken seriously as a group. But we're also viewing it from Cloud's POV, he could just be viewing them as being doofuses. People around them certainly take them (and Barret 'definitely not based on Mr. T' Wallace) like a serious threat.

Again, this doesn't get looked at too in depth because the game is constantly moving and constantly setting up little pieces that are going to go off eventually. Tifa and Cloud's past together and their connection. Cloud's mysterious flashbacks/memory voices that pop in at weird times. Mentions of the great warrior, Sephiroth. The sheer callous evil that is the Shinra Corporation. And then, all of this starts to go off when Cloud falls through a Church roof and meets a flower merchant.

The plot of the game, the real plot of the game, begins when you meet Aerith (I know the US translation insists on Aeris. I'm using the universally accepted version). She is a mysterious woman who looks and has the skills of a flowery and squishy Mage, but is actually a bold tomboy. Her involvement is ultimately what makes this a simple story of freedom fighters against a Capitalistic Regime into something on a much grander scale.

During this current run on the game, I realized how fast they were going by everything. Details about the world, some of the people and characters. They were playing fast and loose. You were given just enough information to get the gist, then we'd move on to the next piece. The only time it felt like I was in what would be a now traditional RPG was during the whole Wall Market affair where I was doing errands and chores for the entire Market in a bid to sneak into some place with the most success. Other than that, the story was entirely linear.

The entire story in Midgar could have been an entire game right there. From the assault on the Reactor to the  the rescue up the entire 70 floors of Shinra Headquarters in the heart of Midgar, that's set up-second act-denouement right there. The game could have been over, Cloud could resolve the sticky little triangle he suffered between Aerith and Tifa (or the girls could leave him alone, either way). But no. It's only until you reach what would be the end of the story that you're introduced to the real  problem.

This Bitch Right Here

It's not until the creature known as 'Jenova' appears that the narrative changes. When things go pair shaped at Shinra HQ and Jenova bursts out of her/its cage, Cloud stops the show and announces that Shinra, the evil empire they and we've been dealing with for the past few hours, aren't the major threat to the planet. Keep in mind that Cloud up until now has only been doing things on a personal basis, even including saving others because they mean something to him. Cloud goes from ambivalent about the fate of the world to pointing us at the threat really fast, and with good reason we'll find out soon enough.

Now, going through the game, the dialogue and writing of the game's text has not held up well in the past two decades. Because of a lot of graphic limitations, we have to be told how bad things are instead of being shown how bad things are. But even then, we've no real context to go on. How bad is it on the outside, is there even an outside left? There's mention of a war that had gone on a few years before, but that's it. All we know is Midgar at this point.

We've no context as to where Midgar is compared to the rest of the world metaphorically speaking. We are shown more in the few minutes of the Remake announcement that cements that Midgar's environment is slowly degrading than the first act did. That's one of the reasons this game deserves a remake. So much detail was clearly put into the setting of Midgar that a full blown game could have been done by expanding the first three hours of material, but so much of the time was spent tell us about it. In a modern game, we can get the nuances of the setting and the character for granted, whereas before even though we were seeing the scenario it was so stylistically and graphically coarse that we had to fill in the gaps still.

The Midgar Arc serves the purpose of getting the player acquainted with the main characters, the antagonists, and kick starting the major problem in the setting. Because once you leave the walls of Midgar, it is an entirely different world out there.

- Later,

C

Designs (an Ex Arcana Fic)

This is my first crack at trying to write for my Ex Arcana character. All information is OOC, this is just a fun experiment.

            Lin saw red.

            It wasn't a violent color. It was steady. The color of fire, live and vibrant. It pulsed like life's blood. Lin followed that pulse, following its rhythm and design. He felt it guide his motions, guide his hand. He didn't move, not intentionally. He let the color move him. He could feel his cheeks flush at the thought of the heat in the color, and the memory of the monsters he'd seen, the boy who became flame and the Phoenix he knelt before.

            Lin let the red flow through him.

            When he opened his eyes, the design was done. It was a simple piece of line work, which is sometimes the hardest. No breaks, a focus on a continuous line. This one began as a pulse beat, and then became the New York Skyline until it became the another pulse again. The lightly tanned skin that bore the work began to glow with life and blood. Nearly an hour of work and activity and energy would emphasize the color and lines there for a few hours, maybe a day or two.

            The girl whose wrist had been Lin's focus for the past hour also glowed. She was coated in a patina of sweat, and her cheeks were flushed. She looked like she'd just come back from a light jog or had some mildly exertive sex. Lin knew some people where getting a tattoo and getting laid were part of the same car pool, but he wasn't sure if this girl was one of them.

            She looked down at the ink and smiled. "That," she said, her voice heavy as molasses. "That is exactly what I wanted."

            Lin returned the smile with a shrug, "You gave me a good design. Glad you liked it." He dressed the tattoo in plastic wrap, to avoid abrasions, a tube of vitamin E and a card with directions for how to treat the tattoo when she got home. It was practiced and professional, Lin had been doing this for a while now. "Follow that for about a week. After that, you'll have an awesome conversation starter for the rest of your life." He smiled at her, which in turn broadened the girl's smile.

            She had eyes that reminded Lin of olives, a subtly ripe green. Her skin was the light bronze that made Lin think that her family was only a few generations away from some Mediterranean country like Greece or the Southern end of Italy.

            There was a heavy moment between them, and Lin knew what was going to happen soon. "You said that this was for your dad?" His words broke the tension, and his client blinked her olive eyes a few times as if in recoil.

            "Yeah," she breathed. "My dad was a first responder on 9/11. He made it out, thank god, but the cancer got him shortly after. He loved this City, and I don't think he ever felt resentment for getting sick for doing his job."

            "It shows," he said. The girl smiled, but the question was clear on her face. Lin sat down  next to her and held out her wrapped up wrist. "You designed the pulse, right? It's been a long while since I'd been hooked to an EKG, but that looks like an average pulse. I'm willing to guess you're in the medical field, right?"

            "EMT," she said.

            "Which also explains the love of the City, you know it intimately. You know the areas that are bad, and the areas that are good. You know when something seems off and to recognize when you're vulnerable. You've seen the bad moments and keep going." I pointed to the pulse beat after the skyline ended, as if it went back to normal. "This is a part of you, as much as it was for your father. You've pledged yourself with this tattoo...am I wrong?"

            The look she gave Lin was intense, "How do you know all of that?"

            He shrugged, "What people design tells you something about them. It's a signature, a ritual, almost." Lin tried to keep the wry sarcasm out of the last part.

            They both kept silent for a moment until she spoke, "Listen, would you be up for a drink some time?"

            Lin pulled out his business card, a simple design with the letters LD in sumi-e. His work number and email were typed on the back neatly. He smiled back, "I'm always up for a drink and a chat."

            "I'm Callie," his client said.

            "I know."

            Before the conversation could go any further, someone knocked on the station door. Morgan was a blocky woman built like Rosie The Riveter's punk granddaughter. She was well built and was covered in tattoos, many of them contributions from the various artists who worked in her shop over the years and probably a few she did on her own.

            She looked worried, "We have a problem. Duck's here."

            Lin looked to Callie and said, "Can you stay here a moment until I come back? I'll knock before I come in." Callie, a little confused, nodded. Lin got up, brushed off his black pants and t-shirt, and turned to Morgan.

            His boss lead the way from the work station to the front counter. Nolan, Morgan's husband, stood arguing with a gentleman Lin had met once or twice. The man was tall and lanky, and looked mal-nourished. His skin was a pale yellow and had the consistency of melted candle wax. Badly drawn tattoos dotted his skin at random places, including a series of black and white diamonds--the kind on a poker card--on his right cheek. His hair was a knotted mess that once could have been blond but was now a colorless mass. He reminded Lin of a scarecrow or some form of ritual moppet, a construct of a human. His eyes were glassy and fever bright, the kind that only fanatics or crazed truly get.

            The man known only as Duck was angrily banging against the counter. "I know Carlo's here, man! I know he's here." He raised himself over Nolon, and yelled out to the store behind him. "Come on out you coward, I need the Stuff!"

            "Listen mate," Nolon said. "Carlo's gone, we fired his ass months ago for selling that crap. Last I heard he's in Riker's for a very long ti--"

            "Don't you fuckin' lie to me!" Duck slurred. He called out again, "Carloooooooooo! Get your ass out here."

            As Lin approached, he could see Morgan and Nolon's muscles tense. Nolon was built just as well as Morgan was. They had met in the army and stayed together when they were discharged. They knew violence, and restraint, and they were both somewhere on the line between the two. Duck's life was very much at risk.

            Not good.

            "Ducky," Morgan said, joining the conversation. She kept her arms out and open to show she wasn't a threat to him. That could change quickly, and Lin knew it. "Let's get you some food, okay?"

            "Stay back bitch!" Duck said. He punctuated the sentence with the snap of a knife opening. The blade gave off a dirty, greasy gleam. "Give me Carlo right now, give me the Stuff!"

            Nolon and Morgan both stopped dead. Their bodies tensed with fear and apprehension, and also preparedness. Ducky, Lin knew, had just gone from being a problem to a threat. Ducky would end up in the hospital and then jail for reasons he'd never fully understand.  

            Not everything has to end in violence, Lin believed. Not unless it has to. Lin found himself less paralyzed by the sight of the blade. Not because he didn't realize the danger, but because things like this lose their edge when a man wishing to vent his spleen puts the tip of an honest-to-god sword to your carotid. You begin to appreciate what it is and not sweat the details as much.

            Lin could talk him down, but he didn't want to take it to chance. He needed an edge. He looked inside him for the right Color. Even after a year he still called them Colors, even though he had long since learned their true name: Aethers. He knew of Black Empyrean and it's control of Intelligence, of Green Geodyne and its focus on Strength and Endurance. He knew of Red Vulcan's enhancement of Dexterity. He knew of them, and that he could tap into them. He'd been able to tap into them for years now without ever knowing what they really were. A year had taught him what they meant, of the others who could use them as well and of the hidden war that had been raging for centuries because of these Aethers. He knew now what they were, and he knew how to use them right.

            And he knew of the fourth Aether, the Blue Ondine. He knew it the best, and standing in the tattoo parlor, he found within himself a strong well of Blue. There were many sources, but he one in particular was strong. He felt it, tapped into it, and let it flow through him. Calm coolness and professional grace flowed through him. He felt wave after wave of coolness take over him and let it stay there.

            "Ducky," he heard himself say. "Put the knife down. Look around you. What is a knife going to do to get you what you need?"

            Lin was perfectly, casually, still. With Ducky a jittery mess and Nolon and Morgan so tense with restraint and fear, it made Lin something of a fixed point in the room. Lin felt Duck's full attention fall on him. For that moment, Lin was the junkie's whole universe.

            So if this fucks up, Lin thought. Morgan and Nolon can hit him while he shanks me. We all win.

            "Come on, Duck. Drop the knife and let's get you some place where you can eat."

            The coolness flowed out of Lin with every word, until he felt it ebb out of him. The Color, the Aether, had run out.

            Ducky, his body jerking as if pulled muscle by muscle in various different directions, dropped the knife. It clattered on the floor with a dull thud. A split second later, Ducky dropped just as suddenly. The smell of offal filled the room.

            "Jesus," Nolon said. He immediately moved towards the Duck's limp body. "Someone call an ambulance!"

            Footsteps thudded quickly from behind Lin Callie, Lin's client, was running down towards them. She moved to Duck's limp body and began checking his pulse. She didn't have her gear, but she was moving with the professionalism of a trained Emergency Responder. She began giving Nolon orders. Callie couldn't have weighed more than a hundred pounds with weights on and had a swimmer's build, but the way Nolon responded would have made you think she was an army Colonel on the field.

            Lin sighed, the energy flowing out of him. He would need to visit Lovecraft after this to refuel. He felt Morgan's quiet presence next to him.

            "You know," Morgan said. "I've always known you were good with words, but seriously, Lin...." she looked back to Duck's limp form. Callie and Nolon were propping him up and EMS had been called in. "Damn, son."

            "You can do a lot with a kind word and an unblinking gaze than you can get with just a kind word," he said weakly.

-----

            An hour or so later, and the world quieted down. Ducky had gone into an ambulance, the prognosis being withdrawal and malnourishment. Callie went into the Ambulance with him, she seemed to know the EMTs. Morgan and Nolon let Lin go while they took care of the shop.

            St. Mark's carried on as it always did, completely unaware that a knife-wielding junkie was just put down with a word. They saw the ambulance, but many didn't pay it head and just moved on as they did.

            It was times like this that Lin wondered if the Shaitan Oath was upheld just as much by people's willing ignorance as their unceasing vigilance against revealing Magic to the 'Silent'.

            Lin made his way down through the streets and past the people as he made his way further into the East Village to Lovecraft. The bar was one part meeting hall, watering hole and refill station for the community of magic users known primarily as The Eldritch. It was a lot of other things as well, as Lin found out in his research. A small iron key hung around his neck, belonging to something in the lower reaches of the building. Considering the bar's namesake, he wasn't in too much of a hurry to find out. He just wanted to get to the bar, drink some absinthe, and refuel on his Aethers. He was nearly depleted of his Ondines and his Vulcans, and of the four Aether, he relied on them the most.

            As he walked through Tompkins Square, his phone buzzed his in his pocket. He didn't recognize the number.

            "Hello?"

            "Adolin," the voice said. It was familiar, woman's voice. An old rage began to boil in Lin's chest.

            "Go away," he said. It was barely a rasp. He didn't want to draw attention to himself this late at night.

            "But I'm worried about you," the woman said pleadingly.

            Lin's face tightened in a sneer, "I doubt that."

            "I'm your mother," she said.

            "Which is why I said 'Go Away' and not 'Go Fuck Yourself'." He hung up the phone and tried to forget about it. His mother had stopped factoring into his life choices long ago. He was going to Lovecraft, he was going to get buzzed on Absinthe and probably stoned on drawing in Aether from the Threshold buried in there. He wondered if people developed an addiction to drawing in Aethers, or different types of them. People definitely developed a euphoria as they let the power into them, Lin himself one of them. Then there was the situation with Extract and--"

            His phone rang again, breaking him from his tangent. It was the same number. Part of him knew to ignore it, but something in the way it vibrated in his hands made it feel like a challenge.

            "What?" He said in the phone.

            "That," his mother's voice said, heat in her tone. "Was rude. Ad--"

            "You do not get to say that name," he rasped. Everything in his worldview took on a momentary azure hue. He had let himself use the last of his Ondine, out of rage. It was less of a calming tide and more an enraged Tsunami. The energy coursed through him and around him. It was gone as fast as he had said it, "You don't get to say it. Not until you tell me what it means."

            The one or two people around him stopped and looked at him. He looked at them, acknowledging their presence, and they all went back to what they were doing. No one wants trouble, and while he didn't use magic, per se, they probably felt the strangeness coming off of his and his words. They wanted no part of it.
            His mother's voice held firm on the other end, "I have my reasons."

            "Yeah? Then your reasons don't involve me. Leave me alone."

            There was a pause on the other end. Lin could practically hear her shore up her own resolve. He had to have gotten it from somewhere, and his father died too early for him to qualify. "Fine. Dear. We'll have this conversation when you're in a better mood."

            He had made his way out of Tompkin's Square and made a turn South. "I'll be in a better mood when you tell me the truth." He sneered, "It's not like you just conjured it out of the Aether, right?"

            Silence on the other end. Lin hung up the phone, and shut it off.

            Yes, now he needed that drink.

-----

            The Lovecraft's basement smelled faintly of water, that's what happens when you were one of the neighborhoods submerged during Hurricane Sandy. The bar itself was a mixture of browns and brass and stone. He wasn't entirely sure it had been built by the Magisters, or if the Threshold and the magic around it told the designers that that's how it worked. He didn't ask these things, the answers scared him some. But the place was exactly as one expected with a name like Lovecraft: it looked and felt like the Absinthe den of a long dead occultist.

             He had long since refilled his Aethers at the threshold, it was the first thing he had done. He could feel the colors back in him. Blues and Greys, mostly, Ondines and Empyreans. A glass of bright green absinthe--his third--sat half finished on his table. Two note cards laid next to it, and a black brush-pen lay on top of that. There were two words on each sheet. One read:

            Adolin Dain

            And the other:

            Lin Dain

            Lin had never known why his mother, Marjorie Dain, had named him Adolin. The name did not exist before him. Where did it come from, why give it to him? He knew so little of his parents' past. He remembered very little, before running off. He remember rituals, and meetings. He remembered men who felt powerful coming to meet his parents, and him he remembered. They were interested in him. And he remembered a word: Babalon. When he read the word in the Libris Ex Arcanum, it unnerved something in him, tore the hinges off something he'd shut down for years.

            Part of Lin was afraid that all of this was connected. The magic, the monsters, and him. After years of running, hiding, conning and stealing to keep away from his mother's legacy, he may have ended up a part of it all. He didn't believe his mother was an Eldritch herself, that would be impossible considering all of the precautions taken by the Arcanum before the Century of Silence. But things had been known to slip up, and there were other elements out there that were aware and waiting between the two or three generations where the magic left and came back. None of those options particularly thrilled Lin.

            "What people design tells you something about them," He said to no one in particular. He took the notecard that said Adolin Dain on it and placed it over his tables candle. The small flame burned a black and brown hole into the card. It made him think of ritual offerings, of leavings for prayer to some god. Lin wasn't sure if he believed in any god enough to worship them. He'd met at least three beings in the past month that certainly qualified for the distinction, but without naming names he let out a small prayer of whatever plots and plans were in store to come over him.

            He doubted anyone heard them.

            He looked down at the last note card, the one that read Lin Dain. In a fit of pique, he grabbed his ink pen, uncapped it, and wrote out A, D, and O, restoring his name back to full.

            "What was your design with me, mom?" he asked to the trailing plumes of smoke. "How am I your signature, how am I your ritual?"

            No answers came to him that night, as they hadn't for all the nights he asked.

            

On The Fury Road: Notes from GenCon 2015

36 hours after trudging my suitcase back up my Bronx apartment, I find myself sitting at my laptop trying to process the trip I just went through. I've just come back from my first trip to GenCon, the four day convention in Indianapolis which showcased any and all forms of gaming. Video Games, Card Games, TableTops, War Games, and Larps. It was a celebration of all things games, and a meeting of the industry that creates them and the fans that play them (who are, most often than not, both).

My trip began last monday, July 27th. I crashed with the members of Phoenix Outlaw productions. Shoshana, Josh, Nico, Justin and Abigail had all been to GenCon before. They had tried to explain to me what I was going to. Now, I'm a veteran of New York Comic Con. I've done DexCon and most of the Double Exposure conventions this past year. I knew what they were saying, and I wasn't getting parts of it. Like the scope wasn't right in my head. 

Eventually, I told them that I was going to have to treat this like the Matrix: I couldn't be told what GenCon was. I'd  have to see it to believe it.

We left early tuesday morning. There were detours early in New Jersey, which delayed our entry into Pennsylvania until the early evening. I don't know if anyone has ever driven through Pennsylvania. As someone who has relatives in the center of that state, allow me to state a theory: Thomas Penn founded that state using Illuminati magic and the bones of the Great Old Ones. PA does not function in the Space/Time Continuum like normal places, and has been known to drive, quite literally, most motorists insane.

Hours of Non-Euclidean Road Tripping lead us to crash in a hotel outside of Pittsburgh, where we were then joined by the members of Clan Jaffe (of Nerdy City, the developers of Pacfiic Rim: Rise of Tiburon; and ExArcana: the Chronos Mage game). We knew as well, that somewhere out there, the members of Eschaton Media (Dystopia Rising, Chronos, and many others) were also close at hand in the vicinity.

It should be mentioned that this trip was littered by quotes from Mad Max: Fury Road. A bunch of eccentric geeks not unfamiliar with the End of the World driving through unending roads and adventures. And as the three gaming companies moved through the east coast and into the interior states in a demented form of Wacky Races, with the burning sun of an imminent August coming down on us, it felt appropriate.

And Now...the Weather.

Getting into Indianapolis early Wednesday afternoon, I was immediately struck by what I saw. Downtown Indianapolis, for blocks around the Convention Center and the hosting hotels, was taken over by gamers. The hotel we were in, which was a converted trainyard, was filled with staff and nerds. Our keycards were printed with Settlers of Catan images. They knew us, and they welcomed us. The pub we went to for the Indie Game Developer Network party was full of eccletic peoples all talking and networking and being there for games, as was the bar where I got to watch the Diana Jones Awards be announced. By the end of the week, 60,000 gamers were in Indianapolis for this event. NYCC doesn't get that level of takeover. The only other conventions I know of of that level is San Diego Comic Con and DragonCon in Atlanta.

As mentioned before, I was working with Phoenix Outlaw productions. My main job was on Friday. During most of the convention, I helped Shoshana get to her panels which ran from all the corners of the convention. I got to see an industry panel for Evil Hat Productions, panels of diversity in gaming and women in gaming post-gamergate. The rest of the time was spent on the vendors floor, or as a runner for errands that needed to get done before the Dresden game while other members of the team were running Smoke and Glass or Dreamdiver.

Dresden Lives was an interesting excercise. Many of the people who attended weren't just first time players of the game, but first time players of larps. This lead to a challenge that I think we accomplished, and I think we showed the accessibility of the system and the setting. At one point during the game, I realized that the The Dresden Files books had become a gateway for people to try larping, inspired by the want to be a character in a favorite and accessible world (thank you, Jim Butcher). Likewise, there were many people who after playing the game wanted to read the series if nothing more than to get a better feel for the setting we were running in.

We were a packed house that night, playing to 55 people. That number would scare me, but after running a game for 85 in the beginning of July, 55 just doesn't have the same zing as it used to. Every game sees the players and the staff up their games and come up with something new and dynamic. And while it is always tiring at the end, it is a thrill to experience and be a part of.

Though at one point, I had to make a call to the Caffeine Gods...

We also got to use tokens for Fate Points. One of the things about Dresden Lives is that it is powered by the Fate Core system, which relies on Fate Points to power character Aspects and other special skills. Campaign Coins (shameless plug) was selling brass tokens specifically for Fate, and we were lucky enough to sell Phoenix Outlaw a set of them for the players. I felt this kept using the points all the more real to the players, as they had physical reminders of the cost of their actions and the rewards of doing something that may cause them drama. 

Fate Tokens in the Center, Plus CC's numerous Fantasy Currency

After Dresden, the volume of the weekend seemed to die down. We were off the hook collectively and could get some leisure in. I managed to get in a game of Ex Arcana, run by Sean and Megan Jaffe of Eschaton Media and Nerdy City. I don't think I've talked of Ex Arcana much here, but it's a game of Victorian Mages finding themselves in modern days to train the new generation of magic users while finishing the war that forced them in exile. So, Steampunk Magic in Modern Day. Yes, I'm a fan. Especially when places like Lovecraft in New York City and the Union Station are considered setting appropriate.

Excuse Me. I'm having Feelings Again.

This game of ExA was very intimate, and actually allowed me to find my character more. My Character, Lin, is a bit of a cypher to every one including himself. He's a pragmatic rebel, a loyal opposition. He's someone who prefers to talk things out, while also trying to figure out the angles and the exits. He's not the best thief, he's not even the best mage. But he's someone who can see where one could use the other. For someone who has been playing this character for a year, it was nice to finally get him settled in with that.

The Game was also very well crafted and executed, which has become the norm for Nerdy City. While they always use the mechanics provided (the Chronos Cards) they also allow for challenges that must be done live. Having cards that could solve puzzles means nothing, you need to actually DO the puzzles. This leads to an interesting interaction between Craig and Lin. Craig is ambivalent about puzzles, Lin effing loves them. It comes from a history of picking locks and doing art. He likes to use his hands and he likes exploring designs. Lin's more of a pragmatist than I am. These puzzles also keep us engaged in the game, and not drifting off, especially with a deadline.

The quiet moments, what few there were, were spent talking and drinking and getting to know people better. It's fascinating seeing so many people at this place, talking about this. I got to learn about the business and the politics of gaming a little --which is a good and a bad thing, for those of you who follow those sorts of things. I ran into friends whom I haven't seen in years, and some whom I'd only known in cyberspace. I made a few connections and got introduced to people whom I would never have gotten to meet otherwise. I also had a group of friends I could hang with, which for someone with a raging cause of social anxiety is worth its weight in silver.

I've mentioned this before, but I never really had a place growing up where I could feel like I belonged. There was no real language for being a geek, even during college I'd never really been able to say "I'm a geek". I had to graduate for me to accept that. So coming to something on the scale of GenCon was a massive eye opener for me. Watching geeks and gamers of various shades, stripes and structures live in this town for a week to celebrate gaming and geek culture makes me feel like I'm actually a part of something.

The drive home was more subdued, driving head long into the night. After 18 hours, I asked myself if it was worth it and worth coming back to? Yes, and Yes. Next year, I want to meet more people, do more panels. I want to get my ideas out and get people to notice.

So I'll be back in Indianapolis next year, I hope to see you there.

Later.

C

Kensei and Building a Positive Gaming Culture

I've come to the conclusion that game developers are secretly anthropologists. They may not notice it or really think about it when they make their games, but the ground work is there. Their writing and mechanics define the expectations and permissions of the world that they wish to create. Some games have really thought about this. Dystopia Rising's system has a spread out mechanics, where if you are going to survive in the threatening environment of the world after nuclear and zombie related war, then you NEED to interact with others. Combat-centric characters need the support characters to survive, and the support need combat centric characters to sell their gear to or use their skills. It's a game of trying to work in symbiosis under great stress of both a personal and environmental level.

The White Wolf system used in Mind's Eye Society really doesn't allow that. It focuses more on the individual. Their skills, their assets, their resources. That makes it very easy to think only of oneself. Combined with the predatory and political nature of the White Wolf games, things tend to take on a CvC and sometimes PvP angle without it being intended. This has caused epic levels of drama both in and out of game. Entire games collapse because people aren't working together In Character or Out because they are too busy focusing on their own.

This has sometimes turned the games that are played into what I've previously referred to as "Pokemon with Sheets". By this I mean that players aren't roleplaying, they are just showing off their sheet savvy. I've seen this turn into a toxic environment, which ultimately ends in the murder of those games. Playing your sheet is, to me, anathema to the whole process of roleplaying.

What this all leads to is me trying to come to terms with the development of my own game: Kensei. Kensei is a larp set during a competitive martial arts tournament. While the game is focused around the fighters, there is an entire community around them of managers, trainers, gamblers, medics, merchants and media. It's meant to be a game about competition. The problem: I've seen too many people trying to game the system, breaking the spirit of the game.

How do I work on a game that is inherently about winning and victory without making it a complete clusterfuck of players trying to out do each other?

Some of the ideas so far are as follows. They are subject to change:

1) All skills must be accomplished by Role Play
Even if you're a fighter, if you're using a skill, it must require some element of role play. From a special attack, to persuading a merchant to slash his prices for you, to even bumping up your Health and Energy stats. You must have a significant level of role play to justify your skills. Your character defines your skills as much as the reverse.

2) You can only advance through collaboration
This is aimed more at the fighters than anyone else. The Social characters are there for the Fighters, but the Fighters cannot advance without working in some form or another with the other characters. A Fight can walk in by themselves and just fight. You can do that, that's great. But you and your gear won't advance. You need to know a trainer, and you need to know merchants and maybe even medics to work with. Keeping the media on your side is also a good idea because

3) Your actions do go noticed
One of the things I enjoyed from playing Requiem was the role of the Harpy. One part Social Column, Another Part Court Reporter. They were the eyes and judging gaze of society. They could raise and lower a person's status within the City, which overall granted some extra benefits and responsibilities. In theory, Harpies were an in character way of keeping the players both in character and true to the venue and the culture. I like the employment of that.

4)Interaction and Oversight by the GMs
The GMs represent both the out of character and in character authority in games. The Marshals are the referees. They must be present for all combat scenes through one form or another to ensure that the rules were maintained. If someone tries to break the rules, well, they also get to be the events security Ninjas, who can put a character down if needed.

5) Trust and Mediation
This is a game where people are in open competition with one another. Their characters can deploy backhanded tactics, their players shouldn't. Ops will have mediation and debrief available for those who need them when situations become too intense or if players come into conflict with one another.

Those are the ideas from now. The problem with developing the culture is that you can plan all you want but the players have to take to it. Another thing about cultures is that they tend to evolve over the years. Maintaining the spirit of the game is something that requires being mindful of the game world, and the players and checking to see if improvements can be made. The idea is to be proactive with involvement in improvements. I've seen too many games fold under their own rules by changing things due to incidences.

For those designers and game runners, how do you help maintain the culture of your games? How do you keep the game honest to it's setting and themes without compromising your players?

Later,

C

Translating Magic and Fate

So, as some of you will realize, I really do enjoy Mage: The Awakening. Like, really like Mage. Some people talk about Vampire (either Requiem or Masquerade), or Changeling, or whatever game being theirs. Awakening is mine.

Mage the Awakening is White Wolf's spiritual successor to it's Classic Mage: The Ascension. Awakening is set in the New World of Darkness line and deals with that line on both a cosmic scale, while still boiling it down to a key facet. In this game, Magic is the manipulation of the fabric of Reality, with Mages being able to perceive and manipulate those forces. Their souls were tied in to the higher realms of power and being. Mages grew powerful, Mages grew in numbers, and then Mages grew proud. They broke Reality as it was beyond repair, creating a gaping maw of reality that permeates the souls of most of the world. Magic is now at a premium, and the ability to use it is hampered by those who cannot use it. Mages must now contend with a world that no longer bows to it.

Awakening is the game of the cost of phenomenal cosmic powers. What happens when you go from a normal human to being the next best thing to a deity? What happens when you must encounter others like you and take sides in their eons long struggles with each other? When is it your fight? Is it your fight? How do you function in a world where the normal population is unable on an innate level to believe you, and therefore is as much an enemy as the monsters and mages you stand against?

It also asks the question of the Soul. A Mage's soul is their link to the forces of Creation. Without it, they are nothing. This is something that fascinates me the most, as someone who loves to discuss the psyche and soul to his heart's content.

There's just one problem: I hate the system the game is based on.

Awakening is part of the New World of Darkness system. It's a crunchy system, even for it's more straightforward lines like Hunter or Vampire. So many factors go into the creation of the character's sheets, it becomes hard to not focus on them. With Mage, it's even worse because Magic isn't free and you run the risk of pulling several times for one single spell. While this works (maybe) for a table top, it rarely works for a Larp. I've heard it said multiple times that Mage is the hardest game to run as a Larp. The math is too much.

There are also hundreds of spells that a player can do for their characters. where the other templates are limited to only a handful. So unless you know exactly what your character is doing next, you could be stuck. There have been many times where an ST has to tell a player that if they don't know the spell they are doing or the affect, they they can't use it during their turn. It takes up time, and larps should not be about doing pulls.

I often feel that when they were translating New World of Darkness from Tabletop to Larp, they didn't go as far as they could have. When situations get really action heavy, larps devolve into Tabletop games. I've had players, most of whom are larp designers and role playing veterans, up and leave because they weren't interested in playing a larple-top

Part of the reason I stopped running Mage was due to the focus on the pulls, which lead to a focus on the sheets, which lead to the lack of focus on the world. No one wanted to experience the plot, they just used the magic to solve the plot. This is a common problem in the MES, aided and abetted by a system that makes everything Quantitative and therefore measurable and finite. You know how strong your Storyteller can make his characters, so you know how you need to make your characters stronger. When you game the system, are you really playing a larp?

A few weeks ago, I was talking to my friend, who is also the Mage storyteller in our Accord game (the game needs experts on the different templates, there are that many) and we talked about the difficulties of playing a Mage in this game. We're also part of the New York Chronicle of Dresden Lives, he a player and me a Storyteller. We talked about the system, which is based on Evil Hat's Fate Core system. It's a narrative system where half of the character The magic in the game is easy and the combat pulls are simplistic. It deals with Qualitative action. How well did a thing happen as opposed to how much of a thing happened. It's simple, it's fun and it can be done without over thinking it.

For example: this past weekend we ran a game of Dresden at Imagine Nation Festival, which was in a camp in Connecticut. We played, in the dark of night, a combat heavy game with roving bands of hunters against the supernatural community. The combat system was explosive and dynamic and didn't take forever. People got to act out what they were doing, thereby diminishing (though not completely covering) the break from immersion. And these weren't small things, people acted being blasted into each other, of eating holy relics of dead gods, they did those things.

So, after thinking about it, I figured what would it be worth to convert Mage the Awakening to the Fate Core system?

That's one of my current projects, to try and translate the mechanics of Mage over to Fate Core. The setting would be left relatively untouched. There would still be the five paths of Mages, each an expert of two of the ten elements of Reality. There would still be five Orders of Awakened Society: The Pentacle. There would still be the Abyss and Disbelief, which level the playing field against the Mages.

The transition so far has been easy. Nothing set in stone, but going over it with my friends (whose names I won't say because they are officers of the MES) there are some points that I'm liking.

Simplifying Magic:
Magic is a stratified system in Awakening, only some can be done at a certain level of experience. Each level opens up access to certain rotes: specified versions of it. However, searching for these rotes can lead to overly long wait times we talked about before. In the Fate Core version, the magic would be considered a Creative Thaumaturgy. Creative Thaumaturgy isn't a specific spell, it's the player declaring a general action using their magic and the Storyteller filling in the blanks. This aspect gets removed from play alot, because it's hard to quantify how that affects the world.

With Fate Core, most skills are done like this. They break down the actions a character can take in four simple steps: Fight, Defend, Overcome an Obstacle, Create an Advantage. With that, and the fact that it deals in Qualitative and not Quantitative affects makes magic much more creative and expressive.

Example: A Mage with control of Fate (because reasons) is in a situation and they are about to get hit hard in the face. They have a few options here, if all they want to do is magic. They can Defend with their magic, and make a pull counter to the attack aimed at their face. They pull their rating in Fate Magic, and whatever difference between the attack pull and the defense pull will lead to Stress. The Defend pull is really well and the Storyteller says that a patch of water on the ground makes the attacker twist his ankle, skewing the blow into ineffectivity. Damn the luck

The Mage can of course attack with Fate, which is simpler and more straight forward. The Mage curses the action, causing the attacker to slip on the patch of the water on the floor and hurting themselves pretty bad. Damn the luck

The Mage, once they aren't being bashed in the head, could try to create an advantage on either the scene or the person. One of my favorite Fate spells is to curse a person, restricting them from acting a certain way. That would count as an advantage on them. The Mage would be able to invoke that to the detriment of the attacker. Damn their luck.

Finally, the Mage could do the most sensible thing: Run. They use their Fate magic to Overcome an Obstacle and find an exit. They pull against the challenge of finding an exit. The spell leads them to a conveniently unlocked door which they bolt out of. The attacker doesn't get to them in time and instead has a door slammed in their face. Damn their luck.

Magic Skills would be part of their own Skill Pyramid. You'd have One good skill and the rest beneath it. It'd be capped, initially, at a (+3), which is about fair and makes invoking your Aspects (Ie; keeping it in the tone of your character) all the more important. You want a stronger spell? Narrate how your Warrior Mage enters a combat ready stance before he uses Space Magic to attack you with his sword from across the room. Make the roleplay actions count towards the magic.

Paradox as a Consequence, Gnosis as a Skill
Paradox is one of those major things that happens when you start futzing with Magic too much. It's when Reality strikes back against any magic it deems is pushing the boundaries a bit too much. The stronger spells in Awakening were considered Vulgar, something that was clearly not plausible or went in the face of Reality on a significant level. Creating Thunder or Fire, changing the physical structure of one's self or another. Paradox is also invoked when Sleepers, normal humans who can't perceive magic, view magic. Their sense of reality is so unshakeable that the magic fizzles and Reality enforces itself further.

In the original, Paradox was it's own mechanic and lead to potentially a lot more pulls before you even pulled for your spell. In Fate Core, they have the Stress Tracks. Stress is the equivalent to damage, though they go away during a scene. The writing describes it as all the little chances that you didn't get hurt, but it's only a matter of time. The real damage, the ones that linger, are Consequences. If your stress fills and you want to stay in combat and not be at the mercy of others, you take a consequence. In physical combat, you may have a broken arm, rib  or be gut stabbed (whatever appropriate). In mental or social settings, you may find yourself Under a Compulsion, or Socially Disgraced. This can happen with Magic.

When casting something deemed Vulgar or Implausible, you pull for Paradox Stress. If you continue to fill up the Stress, you're either out of action or take a Consequence. These can follow the normal parameters of being marked by Paradox, or have a magical anomaly hover around you or worse, Hunted by An Abyssal Manifestation as a Consequence. To be nice, you can spend Fate Points to get mitigate the stress, but you only have so many Fate Points and you only have so many stress and consequence slots.

With all Stress and Consequence slots, there is a skill to help deal with that. For physical situations, you have Physique, your physical endurance. For Mental/Social, you have Will. The higher these Skills are, the more stress you can take. Tank characters would have their physique or will as their top Skill. For Mages, this would be Gnosis. Gnosis in the Original game was your Power Stat, how strong your magic was. It was also the level at which your Paradox pulls were measured. The goal was to pull your Gnosis or Higher, making someone with a Gnosis of 7 (out of 10) very powerful but with a 66% chance of evoking Paradox.

Because the game system in Fate Core is based more on the strength of the Skill and is a Qualitative system, Gnosis makes sense as being their "Magical Toughness". The stronger your Gnosis, the more Paradox Stress you can take on before it explodes. Fate Core focuses more on what you can do, so this changes the tone, but keeps the flavor.

Path as Aspect
While in Accord, there were a few instances where my PC, a Fate and Time Mage, had run into another Time Mage. In Awakening, you gain your magic by bonding yourself by one of five magical realms. Those realms govern two of the ten principles of magic, but you could learn any of the others with little-substantial difficulty. Rhys, my PC, was from the realm that Governed Fate and Time, the other Mage wasn't, but they were also equal to him in Time. In the White Wolf version, this means that if the two of them got into a Time fight (which is a Storyteller Nightmare) then the fight would be even with Rhys being able to cast it free while the other Mage had to spend Mana. You'd think that was a high enough price, but it really isn't. Most fights are over before you expend yourself completely.

So, in the Fate Core version, the Path of the Mage, which denotes what Powers are their strongest, would be considered as Aspects to be envoked when combatting other Magic. It shows that those Mages have governance over those spheres of Magic, yet have to acknowledge the mastery of the others in theirs. This helps mitigate the loss of the concept of Mastery.

The Aspects can also help identify the Character's Order and especially their Legacy. Legacies are subsections of Mages that add specificity in the type of Magic they do. Most of it went towards making strong spells not invoke Paradox, but they also were great for flavor. There were Scientist Space Mages, Mages who can read Fate through the magic inherent in Cities and hundreds of others. Those are Aspects, the kinds of things that come up during stories and that flavor how a Character acts, that can be compelled into plot when needed.


This is all still a work in progress, and I'm still not sure what I intend to do with it. Maybe I'll try to run it at a convention game, or just play it as a troupe game with some friends. This isn't something I want to hock off. It's a labor of love, and those deserved to be shared.

If you have any ideas as to how else these can be translated, or enjoy Mage, send me a comment below. I'll post updates as time goes on.

Later,

C

Maintaining Friendships Built in Larping

This article was prompted by several online friends, you know who you are.

The concept of larping is inherently social in nature. You and a bunch of people get together and portray characters getting together and interacting with one another. Larps and gaming are one of those places where you can make connections very quickly, whether you realize it or not. Someone likes the way you roleplay, or that scene that your vampire and their changeling shared really brought the two of you close and gave you some common ground. Friendships are easily formed in the larping circle, rivalries too, to be honest. It's a great place to meet with your friends and share in one of (I'm assuming) favorite activities.

For the past six years (yes, I'm including Jedi in it, hush) role play has been the central hub of most of my social activities. Through meeting people during games, I've gotten to become acquainted with other people. I'm blessed to say that larping is one of the best things to happen to me socially.

But what happens when that becomes the sole means of interaction between you and their friends? Sometimes we live too far away and can only afford to come down during games, sometimes that wacky thing called Life happens and our day to day gets in between us and the people we consider dear to ourselves. Stuff happens.

I've run into situations like that. And as I said before, larping is a great source of friendship and a great unifying tool. However, it isn't often the best way to maintain a friendship. I have and had friends whom, because of life, I only got to see at game. It was fine, at first, but after a while I began to realize that I was interacting more with their characters than I was with them. That's the problem with using larp as the central rock of your friendships: half the time you're not you and they aren't them. So what here is real?

The key to keeping a friendship between larpers is to extend the friendship outside of larping. We're living in an age where we can chat with, interact, and see each other from miles away. I have friends I converse with on Facebook, Tumblr, Skype and Google Hangouts. Even if it's briefly, the key is to touch base with one another on a somewhat frequent basis. It's dependent on you and your friends as to what 'frequent' means.

I can't stress how important it is to have communication outside of game and about things that do not revolve around game. There are incidences where when I'm hanging out with friends I please ask that we not bring up games. I can be enthused and excited with the best of the puppy dogs, but after a while even I get tired of having the same discussions over and over again. Finding a common ground outside of larping is necessary. I've had frienships wither away, and the usual sign has been when you notice that you're only interacting with the other friend during game, or only about game. To me, that's not friendship. That's being really tight players together. While they're both good, one does not necessarily mean the other.

Another important thing to do is to check in with each other during game. This is especially important if you're playing characters who are emotionally invested in one another. By this I mean as lovers, family, comrades, rivals, or enemies. Always check in with one another afterwards to reinforce that what part is the character and what part is the friendship. I've watched and taken part in too many conversations as a PC which was dripping with unspoken subtext from out of character. It gets awkward and potentially leads to the relationship (the out of character one) turning toxic.

These are just some of the things that I've found helpful in relationships. What have you found that helps?

Dreamation 2015

I just got back from Dreamation 2015, the annual convention run by Double Exposure, the organizers for DexCon, Metatopia and many other events. This was also the first time as an official member of the Phoenix Outlaw Production staff, working as a Storyteller and GM. It was a good con and one hard worked at.

The Dresden Lives games experienced what we (the Storytellers) were calling a Mid-Season Finale. The Chronicle , the grand sum of the story as told with the players, has spanned many years and numerous conventions across the United States This weekend was the culmination of all of those plots and moving on to a new mode. Conspiracies were found out, and antagonists were revealed. There was also a conversation of power and responsibility, themes that are prevalent throughout the Dresden Files. When the things that bump come out of the dark to attack you, how do you make your stand? In a room full of Wizards, Vampires, Shifters, Mobters, Valkyries, Changelings and a whole host of other creatures and human, it's interesting to see where people made their stand.

I got to play three different characters throughout these games. Each one had their own motivations and troubles. The first was a doctor who was monitoring children prophesied to help bring about the end of the world. Unfortunately, those children were the children of the supernatural community of New York (read: a large chunk of the players) and they were mightily pissed. The character meant well, and would easily flip to the player's side when things were explained. However, he was also limited in what he could do to help them.

So, a few pissed off supernaturals essentially having an office drone asking them if they've tried turning it on and off? Yeah, that went well. In the span of ten minutes he was arrested, released, arrested, cornered and then had his heart ripped out of his chest. Full on Temple of Doom.

I next played a faceless monster who was once a human but had his personality completely deleted for the Conspiracy that abducted the children. He was set as a door guard, a powerful one, to keep the children protected. People tried to beg him, people tried to cajole him, and there were plenty of threats abound. They could have attacked him, and most of them would have made it through. But then one character made a decision. Because of plot, he had access to an alternate option. With the Storyteller's approval, he offered to take the children to another plane of being, effectively keeping them out of the way for everyone. That got them through. But it came at the cost of the PC who did, thereby marking the first PC death.

The faceless guardian remained with the children in the plane, swearing to protect them to their family members. Even at the next night's game, he was brought up. That made me feel good because he made an impact on people.

The next night I played Warden Parrish. Parrish is a Warden, which in the Dresden Files world means that he is a human Wizard who works for the White Council, the ruling body for Mortal Magic users.He's their cops, soldiers, and executioners. Wardens don't take "I didn't know" as an answer and are quick with the flick of the blade. The City of New York, for their gross litany of miscalculations, omissions, and just acts of wackiness, were held on trial by the Supernatural Community as a whole, with three Wardens presiding in Tribunal. Of the Three, Parrish was the most remote. Barely speaking, eyes blocked by sunglasses. Hands covered in black gloves. The only thing revealed on him was his sword. He wasn't a big talker, but when he did it was decisive.

Playing Parrish, I didn't want him to be just "I'm the one who kills you." He's Javert-like in that he will hunt you down until judgment day if he thinks you need a huntin'. But he's not one-dimensional. He has his own mind about how things work. I got a lot of compliments after game about how intimidating Parrish came off. He'll be a fun Face NPC (read: an recurring NPC) to play.

It was interesting watching the threads tie together during Dresden. Years of secrets got outted and revealed and characters had to make a lot of interesting decisions that will undoubtedly affect the second season.

I didn't sign up for much during the weekend. Aside from working on Dresden I had entered myself into a boffer tournament. It was sponsored by Oblivion Larp, a dystopian Boffer Larp in New Jersey. Several of the runners of Oblivion came in to Dresden the day before, giving me the opportunity to go "HELLO NEW FRIENDS". I've never done a boffer tournament before, point of fact I really don't get the chance to do boffer larps due to money and time. So getting a chance to try out some things was interesting to say the least. It also made for good research in developing Kensei, as I'm currently still bashing my head as how to make a combat system that is entertaining to both the fighters and the audience.

There were three tourneys. The dagger fighting one, the open weapon tournament, and a gauntlet course. The dagger fighting I went 1 out of 2 matches. I'm not much of a inclose fighter with weapons. I pretty much fell in love with a miniature Buster Sword, which had a wonderful reach and a wide blade to allow for easy deflections and blocks. I went 2 of the 3 matches I was in. Of the 5 stations of the gauntlet, I only made it to the second one. It was an interesting blend of folks who just liked to try out boffering and players who have been doing this for a long as time and clearly have weapons training. It left me feeling much more positive about Kensei, and needing to do this more.

What is also did was give me some awesome cardio as well. Unfortunately, my gas tank went empty shortly after that. I'm still trying to figure out better ways to keep my energy going during these conventions. To know when to hold em and keep playing and to know when to fold em. It's one of the things that keeps me from DR (aside from the aforementioned time+money) is that I am not a 24 hour marathon person. I like my sleeps. I was debating going to Ex Arcana, the Chronos system larp developed by Eschaton Media and Nerdy City productions (the venerable House of Jaffe). I was on line to sign in for game, when I felt my energy jackknife.

You see, not only was the boffer tournament matches exerting in ways I haven't done in months, it's Lent and I--like a moron--gave up soda. For those of you who haven't met me, I'm a Coke Fiend. I love my little red soda cans. So giving that up and then running a convention where I can't eat meat on Friday and can't drink cold caffeinated beverages (I don't drink hot drinks, sorry) meant that my blood-sugar levels were going WEEE! at various points.

So, I did the smart thing, backed out and let people who had never played it get a shot. When I went upstairs to nap, I looked at my recently purchased book for Ex Arcana (now available in PDF and softcover on DriveThruRPG) I realized my name was listed in the Playtesters section. I'd forgotten outright that I played a game before, so that became a magnificent surprise. I also know that there will be other games, and now that I have the deck and the book and actually know what the hell is going on, I now have plans and ideas.

My convention, otherwise, was rather chilled out. After going to a few of the Double Exposure conventions this year, I feel like I know a sizeable chunk of the population by face if not by name. For someone whose social anxiety is practically a lifestyle choice, this is a relief. I got to talk to Ashley Zdeb, co-founder of Eschaton Media. Eschaton is responsible for Dystopia Rising, the Apocalyptic Boffer Larp that is now a widespread network throughout North America. It's my opinion that DR has helped to redefine how boffer larps could be played. We also talked about the amazing response to the Chronos Larp system, and how Ex Arcana is being received. I know several of the incoming games, and many of the homebrews that were put on (example: of the Six Chronos games: two were based on TRON and Neverwhere, respectively) show off the versatility of the system. We also talked about our shared background in the Mind's Eye Theater/White Wolf  games.

I also got to see Sarah Lynne Bowman, editor of the Wyrdcon Companion and my Jungian Psychology in Larp Sempai. We didn't get down to sit and talk much, which was sad. We were too busy running around and doing our games. Sarah is an awesome human being and one of the people spearheading the academic backing of role playing games in all its forms. Also present, but I never got the chance to meet her, was Whitney 'Strix' Beltran, another researcher and expert in mythology. So there were arguably the two preeminent researchers into mythology and larp AND I COULDN'T FIND THE TIME TO TALK TO THEM.

One Day. Dammit.

Finally, friend of mine from Mind's Eye Society came to his first convention, in which he damned me for making him have fun and make new friends. I consider that a victory. He was a playtester for my Dresden game in June and now he got to play the same character in the official larp. I do believe he's hooked in, and is now a member of a group in the game that has some very large overarching plot. It's nice to have someone from my first and main source of gaming come into the new world I've come to enjoy, and then make them drink the cool-aid and want to come back for more.

it's all part of the job :D