This past Saturday was the fourth session of the playtest / beta that I’ve been running (third session and prior…

This past Saturday was the fourth session of the playtest / beta that I’ve been running (third session and prior linked here: https://plus.google.com/109896206941346348750/posts/djWkRsypGvp) with a Cutter and a Whisper.

Feedback:

* We upgraded everyone to the v3 final character sheets. The Cutter missed Handle being gone, but we figured it was now smeared between Tinker and Finesse. The Whisper was happy to see Invoke go.

* One thing I tried this session was ignoring unities of time to make a challenge more interesting. The crew improved their turf by clearing some drug dealers off an abandoned boardwalk. Every challenge had been dealt with but the addicts who loitered in the area (progress clock “Our Loyal Customers” at 2/4). Since the last big triumph had been a rousing victory over some goons, it felt weird to dial the energy down and say “okay, now go roust these junkies.”

So, instead, we narrated that the crew retreated to their hideout, considering the mission “successful,” and planning to return the next day to set up shop. When they arrived the next morning, though, they found a crowd of addicts pawing through the drug dealers’ burnt-out shop, desperate for adulterated leviathan blood. Resolving the last 2/4 of the progress clock was the tragicomic denouement.

This was revelatory for me. Rather than insisting a “mission” is a discrete unit of time and space – you can’t leave the “mission zone” until all the challenges are three-starred! – I let the narrative unfold, inspired by the remaining challenges.

* Sidenote: in our Duskwall, the tell for leviathan blood addiction is bony protrusions (like the narwhal horn leviathans are known for). Junkies get sharply pronounced cheekbones and ridged knuckles, with actual bone spurs jutting from their hands in the terminal stages.

* I’m getting better at adjudicating effect size for combat challenges, but still need a better gauge for everything else. Is the Whisper’s attempt at parlay low potency or medium potency? This will come with time, I’m sure.

* And, per my comments last time, I finally found a way to challenge the Cutter in combat: have the victim run away. He had fun regardless, declaring that his “unusual weapon” was a bola (“got it from some bleedin’ savage on ‘un of me last hauls, and I just been ACHIN’ to try it!”).

As for the events themselves:

The Blackstone Outfit improved their hold by clearing some drug dealers off an abandoned boardwalk. The Cutter smashed goons with his leviathan hammer, while the Whisper called up an unintentionally potent ghost to spook the addicts. Though the dealer’s suppliers – a gang of Leviathan Hunters – showed up as reinforcements, the crew sent them packing, earning another enemy in the process.

Realizing that the Crows were going to demand answers or tribute from them soon, the Outfit asked the Lampblacks to arrange a sitdown. They met Lyssa in a private dining room above the Leaky Bucket, with Mylera Klev of the Red Sashes also in attendance. Though Lyssa was intimidating, the Outfit managed to bluster the Red Sashes into embarrassed silence and argued their value to the Crows. Lyssa agreed to take them under her countenance on two conditions. First, the Outfit was to rob the Bluecoats’ evidence locker. Second, the Outfit was to bring in, alive, the mastermind of the “Green Masks”, the nativists who had attacked the Iruvians at a recent council gala, so that Lyssa could appease the Inspectors.

The Outfit knew that they themselves were the “Green Masks,” having staged the attack to occupy the Inspectors. But they agreed to provide a living head honcho to interrogate nevertheless.