After a computer failure and six months when I just didn’t remember it Redemund’s Guild’s (first) Fiasco playset is ready to be released. This playset was written to capture the feeling of lecherous parties of ancient Rome as depicted in tv-series such as Rome and Spartacus.
We were lucky enough to get a great feedback on this and as it happens the group actually wrote about their gaming session. You can check it HERE.
So here you go. Fata Capuam: DOWNLOAD (pdf)
So we started our campaign two weeks ago. I had written five playbooks with Aki with following the ideas of the players in our gaming group. We had got together earlier to talk about the characters and so most of our group had a good idea of what kind of character they were going to play.
The main point for designing these characters was that they were more “a” than “the”. As the regular playbooks for hacks deal with characters that are the movers and shakers of their worlds in Wayward Sons the characters start out only as regular men and women. They have the possibility of grow to be the most important people of their kind – as well as turn into monsters along the way.
We followed the basic structure of Apocalypse World during this first session. Playbooks were distributed, players fill them out (complaining about bits and correcting others) and afterwards we discussed about the characters and their shared past.
As the established fact was that all characters had had their first paranormal encounter they all decided what was their Angle. (This was something that we quickly realised needed to be presented in the playbook as a choosable option). Within a little over an hour we had created a detailed history for the characters and a horrible mind-map for me to use as a GM as the foundation of the campaign.
Following the advices of AW and told the players that this session was about their characters. We followed them around, used moves and got into trouble. We did not have a fight though. This was actually something a realised only later on. Another thing I noticed was that Wayward Sons probably needs a little more flavourful 1st session sheet for GM.
The summary for the events of the first session:
The characters had arrived the the city of Rapid Falls in North Dakota following the cryptic hint from a Well-Dressed Man. They searched a safety deposit box to and found a large set of papers, photos and 8mm video. While going through the material they realised they were all connected to it and to each other somehow. It all seemed to have something to do with what their fathers and their fathers had done.
Following the leads from the documents the party searched the city archives and tried to make contact with the manager of the bank where the documents where held.
I confess I actually had a basic storyline in mind before we started the session (this actually being a part of a campaign we have been playing for almost two years). Nevertheless the players had a huge impact on the flow of the story and the clues found. It was all in all an excellent starting point for the campaign.
We are getting together to play the second session tomorrow. Hopefully we can work out even more problems with this hack and still have a good time.
The first five preliminary and “this needs some serious editing” playbooks as pdfs:
Notice – Yes. They are all pretty much work in progress. I shared them for feedback.
It is funny that Aki should mention the gaming immersion in his recent post. I encountered some of the problems discussed while I ran tremelus last week.
I had done my homework and read through the rulebook. I had played the game a few times and I had build a framework for the session. But still something was missing. And that was the confidence that is required to run this kind of a game.
Having just recently found the Apocalypse World engine I did not have the same amount of experience from it as Aki did when he ran tremulus. He made it seem quite easy. I found it anything but that. I had to constantly browse through the book to find what moves I could use and how exactly I could do that. I had to consult Aki during the session to get a confirmation that I was doing the thing right. It was a big hassle. At the beginning.
Then I did what I should have done the last time a ran a one shot. Threw to rules out the window so to speak. I wasn’t going to let the rule system ruin yet another session and just lead the game as I usually do. By guiding the flow of events just the way I damn please.
The players where familiar with their end of the system. They new what they were doing but I lost total track of all the tracks and moves I had in my disposal. I just let the things happen the way I thought they might improve the narrative. Was this done according to the principles of tremulus? Maybe not but at least to my knowledge the players had fun and enjoyed the game.
If you want to check out the framework (and maybe give pointers of how to improve it?) you can download it HERE as a pdf.