| [SE] Prep for episodes 1-3 now unlocked! |
[Jun. 21st, 2007|08:57 pm] |
As the busy continues, things are slipping further and further away from being relevant, so it's good to get this out now rather than waiting forever...
For each episode of Slayers East I made a locked post or two, or three, or more, to toss around ideas and get feedback on my prep. SE was set up to demand good, if efficient, preparation and I found that this got me excellent comments from excellent commenters who made a big contribution to how the game was going.
I've unlocked the prep notes for the first three episodes. Clicking on this link will bring you the whole bunch:
http://gametime-nz.livejournal.com/tag/session+prep
Of course, if you're already a friend of this LJ and not a player, you'll see all the locked entries as well :-)
There will be more unlockings in due course. Players - any comments about this? Commenters? Etc... |
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| [Slayers East] The roundup, continued |
[May. 30th, 2007|06:46 pm] |
A couple more things:
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) buzzandhum has written a pretty hardcore account of what it was like to be in the player-space for the closing episodes. He talks about what he was experiencing, what he was trying to do, and his perceptions of the whole unfolding game-thing. It's a great read; you don't often come across such detailed accounts from a player point of view.
It is in four parts, starting here.
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At about the midpoint of the season, I circulated among the players this link from Meg and Emily where Meg writes about two ways of playing, "Noone Gets Hurt" and "I Will Not Abandon You".
To quote from Meg's post:
In IWNAY, the social agreements are:
I as a player expect to get my buttons pushed, and I will not abandon you, my fellow players, when that happens. I will remain present and engaged and play through the issue.
I as a player expect to push buttons, and I will not abandon you, my fellow players, when you react. I will remain present and engaged as you play through the issue
In NGH, the social agreement is that we know where each other's lines are, and we agree not to cross them.
It ended up being quite important to us, I think, making explicit a piece of our "social contract" that had always gone unspoken before and giving confidence as a result.
At the link are examples and further discussion and loads of interesting comments. One thing that comes up is that IWNAY play is dangerous - that there are genuine risks being run, even with the best of intentions and mindful, sincere players. I think that's true. We took real risks in this game, all of us I think, but particularly the players who had invested so much in these characters and could only look to me to guide them out of a horrible, horrible place.
I mention this because I took that responsibility very seriously. There are times when I will GM a bleak story. This was not one of those times. I had promised I would not abandon the players and their characters, and that promise was the premise behind the final episode; whatever else happened, I was going to show a way into the light.
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Soon I'm going to unlock all the player-excluded posts in the archive, so the players can see what went on. Not just yet though - I want to read through it all first and make sure that there's nothing I want to hold in reserve... I'll post here again when the deed is done. |
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| [Slayers East] Candy came back |
[May. 28th, 2007|06:37 pm] |
So, at the end of the long run of Slayers East episodes, the girl who had died saving the world was no longer dead. She had come back to life.
Was this a mistake? mashugenah suggested it might have been, referring to some deep rules of narrative; he also deferred to the fact that the players all thought it was a great ending, and being the audience, they have a fairly reliable insight into what the audience liked. But Mash isn't wrong. His instincts, that Candy should stay dead, were also to an extent mine.
And yet she didn't stay dead. How did this come about?
( Read more... ) |
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| [Slayers East] After the final episode |
[May. 24th, 2007|09:56 am] |
Tuesday night was the final episode, episode 13, of Slayers East season 4. In a break with practice, I didn't share the preparations on this journal, mostly for prosaic reasons - I was in Melbourne, and then in a new apartment, with no internet connection.
The story that unfolded in the episode is related on the Slayers East website, here. It begins:
Everyone reels from the death of Candy. Cynth attacks Zak in a fury; Zak crumples but doesn't resist. Brian tries to resuscitate Candy, while Meryll wails and holds her body. Cass keeps it together and talks with Alison, setting things in motion to take Candy's body to the surface. Nick watches, silent... [the rest]
Everyone was happy when the game ended. There were hugs.
I will write more about this later, either here in comments or in a new post. Even though I'm too busy just now for extensive reflection I wanted to get this out so players have somewhere to post their comments and reactions, and so my trusty LJ advisers and readers can see how it turned out.
(craigoxbrow, coffee_lifeform, you may be interested to know a certain Millicent Blackhurst was namechecked by one of my NPCs, which led to Mr Escher making an off-screen phone call to one of the characters...) |
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| [Slayers East] Stopping the Sun |
[May. 9th, 2007|12:45 am] |
Episode 12 finished about an hour ago. I'm still reeling. It's hard to evaluate what we did and how it all went from so close. It ran long, not massively long, but a bit; and it was intense. I think it all worked.
Candy chose to take on the essence of R'Thilliach, in order to give everyone else a chance to destroy it forever by killing her. Zak, in accordance with the prophecy from season 3, killed Candy.
One episode to go.
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This was an unusual session in another way, too - I did something I have never, ever done before as a GM. I genuinely broke new ground, and I was nervous as heck about it. What did I do? I sang. I wrote a song and sang it, in-character as an NPC, to the players. I had crazy butterflies. But the players give so much to this game, they take such risks (and not always are they rewarded for their commitment), that I figured potentially humiliating myself was worth the risk. |
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| [Slayers East] Episode 11: "Honesty" aftermath |
[Apr. 25th, 2007|03:39 pm] |
[Note: this is open to all]
Well, that was intense. The spotlight episode for Jenni's Candy, the slayer at the core of the Slayers East crew, was quite gruelling. In prep, Jenni had indicated she wanted to tackle Candy's dishonesty which is one important aspect of her main issue of 'doubt'. So I didn't hold back, and as an opening salvo threw Candy, alone, against the seasonal big bad Augustus Langborn, who humiliated her and then told her exactly how he'd managed it. In order to protect herself, Candy had to start being honest to everyone.
And so the stage was set for some intense roleplaying, as Candy faced up to her unacknowledged love interest Nick and confessed her feelings to him; and later, as she came clean to her family about her troubles. And, fitting in with the general theme, Zak confessed to a number of people about the magical powers he's been quietly developing for the last five episodes.
It all came to a head with another major shift: Lex Madsen came out of his coma. He revealed that while unresponsive his spirit had spent six months journeying through demon dimensions and as a result all his foolish emotions and compunctions had burnt away. He then started a duel to the death with Candy. I was gutted to farewell this character, who has delivered me so much cool story since his debut at the start of season 2, and who I really liked for his complexity and failings and arrogance and for the fact that he was never a villain. But the theme of this season is Change, and Lex's awful change was part of that. The players should have got a bad feeling way back in episode six when the notoriously ungrateful Lex actually said "thank you" to Candy - that was a sign that things weren't going to end well with him...
The whole thing came together quite well from very scattered notes and a plan that I had simplified greatly from earlier versions thanks to feedback from the Secret Commentariat. (I only used one of the three act breaks I had in my notes, the other two arising naturally in play!) My preparation could only ever go so far - this episode was always going to be driven entirely by the character interactions and how the players explored the dramatic situations. And unsurprisingly they totally came through, and there was some truly wonderful material here.
Weak points in the episode - Langborn's casual invocation of a snake out of Josh, echoing the snake born from Lex back in episode 3, came across as a bit arbitrary and "giving the others something to do". Of course, that's what it was - Langborn wanted to clear the room so he made it happen to distract people - but it was meant to have another layer or two as well. There just wasn't quite enough space in the episode to play with the idea. Josh gets sidelined yet again! Still, it did give Cass and Cynth an opportunity to do some combat awesome, which isn't a strong point for either of them, and it led to the first ever rules-tactics discussion in a Slayers East game. A milestone of sorts!
Cass and Cynth in general are still proving tricky to engage. I haven't found good, reliable ways to get drama for these two characters, and the ways I think are there (Cynth and the band, Cass and her mother) I've been sidelining in order to push forward with the main plot. The scene-framing resource is intended to allow players to make sure their character gets some drama but it's been little-used, not least because the episodes always seem to be packed full of stuff already. Anyway, something to think about, and for Giffy and muggle to hassle me about.
If you've read this far then you definitely need to read Jenni's writeup over at Stonesoup.
In two weeks: the 2-part climax begins! |
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| Slayers East episode 10 |
[Apr. 4th, 2007|12:02 pm] |
Episode 10 is now done, and Cynth has had her turn in the spotlight. Not a lie that I found this episode difficult to prep for; in fact, I think this episode got more thinking time than any previous one. It was tricky! But with the help of my secret squirrel advisers I managed to cobble together an effective episode based on Cynth's character issues, and in the process I think I learned more about what an issue and a crisis need to be to get story out of them. More on that in due course, after reflection.
The episode dealth with Cynth's unacknowledged feeling that if she left town at the end of the year she'd be letting down her friends, who (more or less) have to stick around and fight monsters. Her unhappiness with this was manifested, in true Buffy style, in demon form. Both players and characters understand the rules of Buffyverse enough to know how this works. A favourite scene:
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[after big bad Langborn mentions 'personal demons' to Cynth, she encounters a spooky critter in a bathroom, and promptly heads to the Slayers East HQ]
Cynth: Brian, do you have some spells or stuff to figure out if this is my fault?
SMASH CUT TO Cynth sitting cross-legged in a magic circle while Brian holds an old tome and looks grave
Brian: It's your fault.
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And the wedding finale sequence was a great way to finish. Thanks everyone! |
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| Slayers East episode writeups |
[Mar. 21st, 2007|09:51 pm] |
Episode 9 was a blast. Funny, intense, and leavened with decent character moments and a major step forward in the season arc. Hurrah! Four episodes to go...
The short writeups for episode 8 and episode 9 are now up on the website. As usual, thanks to all the commenters on the super-sekret posts who helped me come up with nifty stuff for the game and sort out exactly what I was/am doing.
(But don't reveal any secrets here, because this is an open post!) |
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| [Slayers East] R'Thilliach |
[Mar. 14th, 2007|03:41 pm] |
Still no notes about the next ep of SE, on account of a player asking not to do a spotlight due to personal issues and not wanting the stress. I can respect that, although it does leave me scrambling.
So to get my house in order I've been writing proper notes about the big and little bads in teh game. First, my Lovecraft pastiche, R'Thilliach...
( Read more... ) |
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| [SE] A Difficult Situation |
[Mar. 8th, 2007|10:15 am] |
Episode 8 was a success. It was one of those lighter episodes where everyone gets affected by a magic spell (like Band Candy, Him, and Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered). Everyone got into the spirit, everyone’s favourite B-characters Troy and Alister stepped into the limelight, and major plot arcs were advanced not a tiny bit.
(Well, okay, a tiny bit. We saw that Nick was up on the hill performing some ritual to try and wake up his still-unresponsive father... This was the final shot of the episode, was not something I had planned, but was a spur-of-the moment thing inspired by questions in-character about where Nick had been.)
But I have a real problem on the horizon. I need help: how do I get one player character to stab another player character?
( Read more... ) |
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| [Slayers East] Episode 8 |
[Feb. 27th, 2007|12:47 pm] |
Well, episode 8 and it is time for something frothy and fun!
* all the big angsty stuff is resolved (ish)
* the treasure hunt is over, so the supernatural stuff dies back down
* Halloween night is coming! Which in the Buffyverse is a quiet night.
* Cass is making a film - apparently a documentary about the "cool girls" at school
* Cass and Cynth are introducing uni student Josh to the supernatural stuff in the world
I'm thinking of reviving a plot idea from very early discussion on this LJ:
There's a force in the student body promoting rebellion? The nascent band is directly tapped to take part in a rebellious movement on account of rock'n'roll=rebel yell... Cass/CC has to choose how she's going to fit in... Oh! Even better idea!
The students find that there are two rival 'cliques' forming in the school. Are you with the Xs or the Ys? The band could be courted by both of them, as they're both rebellious groups wanted the rock'n'roll thing. Cass/CC has to choose a direction... Our SP1 characters, Candy and Zak, could be prompted behind the scenes to favour one side of the divide or the other...
Cause: two ghosts from the 50s (Rebel Without A Cause style) who ran two rival gangs, playing out their rivalry in the new student body. This ties into the spooky West Hallway from episode one!
Climax: a rumble!
I really like this. Especially if all the adults get into the groove as well - as authority figures line up on one side or the other, drama would inevitably ensue...
Cass's issue is still 'fitting in' and while this isn't a spotlight episode I want her in it a lot. So having her as magically unaffected sort of works.
Any ideas for how to tie all this stuff together? How does Halloween fit in with the rebel yell stuff? And heck, I'm not at all wedded to the ghosts or the gangs or indeed the plot line at all, if anyone has any other cool ideas they wish to gift to me.
:-) |
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| [SE] Episode 7 aftermath |
[Feb. 18th, 2007|11:00 pm] |
Well, that went quite well. I've had enthusiastic communications from players, and jenni_talula wrote: "It was also an incredibly moving and emotionally fulfilling night. The Stevens-Knight household is finally beginning to feel like a family... I freaking love this game."
And, that indeed, was what seemed to happen. Brian's breakdown and walkout ended up not being about the slayer thing, but about the family. It was an outcome that showed how the crisis episodes and player-authoring are meant to work - Blair's foreknowledge that Brian was going to lose it didn't pre-script the whole episode, just give it a starting point.
(However, as part of that, the witch as Brian-confidante didn't work as well as I'd hoped. It certainly wasn't dull - Blair playing drunk Brian was a sight to behold! - but it wasn't as revealing as either of us wanted, either. But that's cool.)
Jenni saw Simkiss' betrayal coming; Blair was completely blindsided; other players somewhere in between, I think.
I have laid down a rule for episode 8: No gloomy. Episode 8 will be a lighthearted episode, because we need it! It will include Cass making a movie of the school's coolest girls and their political machinations, and be set at Halloween, which in the Buffyverse is the demons' night off. I'm going to raid the archive of comments from people here to see what ideas I can mine... |
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| [Slayers East] Episode 7 short breakdown |
[Feb. 14th, 2007|11:43 pm] |
Precredits:
Everyone copes with aftermath of last ep
Break on: Mercenary Simkiss suggests a raid on vamp Taresh Ghul
Act One:
Expedition into sewers will not win much support among crew. Brian leadership put to test.
Break on: With Brian already doubting himself, he discovers that Candy is cutting herself.
Act Two:
Brian has to deal with Candy’s self-harming.
Simkiss sewer mission. Does anyone go?
[Pile on other stresses until] Brian bails!
Break on: Taresh Ghul shows himself?
Act Three:
Faceoff with Ghul while Brian is elsewhere getting drunk, alone
Brian is visited by the little witch (from ep 3, who conjured a snake). She has run away as well. She and Brian talk. She offers to use her magic to do 'whatever you want'.
Break on: the witch ensorcels Brian a little, then kisses him, which opens another treasure vault!
Act Four:
The witch goes into the vault, and finds Langborn waiting! Witch and Langborn duel, which puts them out of the picture. (They go off into magic-duel-dimension or something. Witch will die - her smoking corpse can show up later.)
Meanwhile, everyone converges on the vault, where there's a small chest. It can end up with any party - the game doesn't need a specific outcome here. Simkiss will betray the crew if he needs to so Ghul can get it, though.
The treasure turns out to be the knife, not the phylactery.
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As usual, feedback and ideas are very welcome!!
This is much more pre-planned than the last ep, but I don't feel like it's too railroady - Blair knows Brian's breakdown is coming, so its how we get there and how he gets out of it that we'll be interested in discovering. The little witch kissing him will be more a magical imposition than a genuine seduction, by the way. Everyone was scared pantsless by her in her last appearance.
I want to add at least one more big stressy thing that sparks Brian's breakdown. Maybe his devoted wife Meryll should be part of this - perhaps he overhears her talking about him to Candy, 'he's wellmeaning but ultimately you're just indulging him' or something that will shake his confidence... thoughts?
I'm heavy-handedly dragging Jenni's private-story of the self-harming out into the open this episode. I considered asking her permission but then decided not to. There's something important in there about how story authority is shared but I can't tease it out just now.
I'm going to ask all the players to frame their own scenes for their own characters this episode - even though they're all Screen Presence 1 they'll still get some time for angstin' and comedyin'. |
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| Slayers East: Website Updates |
[Feb. 8th, 2007|12:07 am] |
Episode 6, the first back after hiatus, was run on February 2nd. It went well. It was interesting to watch the episode flounder for shape and struggle to run to time, after a conscious decision to give it a more open structure than other episodes this season - in other words, to run it much more like an episode from the earlier runs of this game. The experience made clear to me that the changes I've made have had an impact. This episode felt like all the old stresses, so it was a worthwhile experiment but not one that I'll be repeating.
Anyway, over on the website there's an episode entry for episode 6
and an episode write-up for episode 4
and, last but certainly not least, more pictures! Including the only known pic of the group with Andrew Salmond in the line-up! We all look so young and fresh-faced... The pictures page is a great source of pleasure for me. All gaming groups should take pictures of themselves!
(I've been stupidly busy, but will try to reply to the advice I received from people for episode 6 shortly... rest assured your suggstions were heard, if not always followed...) |
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| [SE] Episode 6 plan |
[Jan. 30th, 2007|11:00 pm] |
Bigger picture stuff was discussed in the previous post. This one is the layout for episode 6.
Before I get into that, I want to direct those of you not subscribed there to the Gametime community, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) gametime, which features an interview with another Buffy RPG GM, whose game runs in a very unconventional way. Check it out.
Now, on with the show:
( Read more... ) |
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| [SE] Overall Seasonal Plot - the Big Bad |
[Jan. 30th, 2007|02:40 am] |
Okay, session 6 is, as previously noted, where I want to change things up a bit and get the seasonal plot in motion. So, riffing off things from various commenters dating back to the first few eps, I now have something to go on. Further comments and refinement and cool ideas welcome!
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Bound under the Langborn estate in Exeter is the creature R'Thilliach. It has previously been established that R'Thilliach is a Cthulhu-style big unknowable alien entity, huge beyond understanding, and so intertwined with the world that to destroy R'Thilliach would destroy everything. R'Thilliach's weird and disgusting spawn, and a vampire cult in its name, have caused problems before, but there has never been any hint that R'Thilliach has any particular agenda. It's too big to have an agenda.
That changes now.
An aspect of R’Thilliach has started acting in the world. It is a possessing force - a living, evil idea, a *bad dream* that has propagated. It isn't a plan so much as a function of an alien god's will. R'Thilliach is now trying to free itself, and in order to do that, it must locate the knife and the ritual that were used to bind it.
Augustus Langborn bound R'Thilliach. Langborn is an occultist who discovered the secrets of the demon Ashmedai and used them to achieve immortality and to glimpse into the future. He discovered R'Thilliach and used a ritual from Ashmedai's texts, and a sacred ancient knife, to bind R'Thilliach deep under the earth. Then, knowing that he could not take the texts or knife away from Exeter without weakening the binding, he concealed them as best he could, using another of Ashmedai's rituals to hide them in hidden vaults that can only be opened by a kiss born of love/lust [one or the other or both, haven't yet decided].
R'Thilliach's influence has raised awareness of these hidden treasures. This, in turn, has sparked a treasure hunt - the Ashmedai texts reveal immortality's secrets, and how to see the future! They are clearly valuable in the supernatural community.
The opening of one of the false vaults [in episode 4] has alerted the immortal Augustus Langborn that there are people seeking to undo his efforts. He will return to Exeter - but he is no hero, Augustus Langborn. He carries the secrets of demons in his heart, and his designs are also dark...
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So this series has two Big Bads. One of them is Augustus Langborn, whose name is well known to the players through the Langborn Estate, scene of much activity and horror; and the other is R'Thilliach. Previous Big Bads worshipped this season's Big Bad. Yeesh.
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So, in terms of this episode, I still want Lex taken out - but I'll hold off on the return of Augustus Langborn. I want the characters to get some backstory first, so they known Langborn was a real person first; his being alive should then come as a surprise to them.
Lex will instead be taken out by a R'Thilliach dupe. Who might R'Thilliach be using? Perhaps Josh, the friendly researcher? Perhaps... Meryll, mother of Candy, wife of Brian, stepmom of Zak? Hmm...
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How does this fit in with the prophecy of Candy and Zak? Well, I'm not sure - but that's why I'm throwing in a plot-crucial knife. We'll work on the rest soon - I think I'll post after this Friday's game about how to approach the prophecy. I seriously will need advice on that.
Coming soon (after I think on this post a little bit more): Episode 6 breakdown |
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| [SE] Website Update |
[Jan. 25th, 2007|05:39 pm] |
For the curious, the Slayers East website has been updated with episode guide entries for all Season 4 episodes to date, and with a full write-up of the first three (just posted the third one now).
See the episode list here. |
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