What's Happening in the Games - 31st October

In WFRP my character is still alive, which is close to miraculous ! We got away from the barrow in the forest, but lost our Mage in the process. We also gained the amusing battlecry of "Beef for Dinner!", pronounced by our elf as he sliced a minotaur in half. Another of the group got arrested for being a mutant, and finally confessed his sins under torture at the hands of some Sigmarites.

Now Carter has been asked to help investigate yet another piece of nasty business going on in Middenheim. I suspect we may just have (acidentally) killed our only 'lead', though...

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In Shadows things are moving along, albeit slowly. My previous post about the interminable combat round with the land mutant bugs has sparked off a fascinating sequence of emails between myself and our GM, in which we have been exploring my character's psychological make up (something we spend quite a lot of effort on in Shadows, in regard to all the characters) and my understanding as a player of the underlying themes of the game.

In game, we have worked out that one of the characters needs to close his 'cycle' or he and his alternate self will probably explode rather messily... We have a rough idea how to achieve that, involving sending a former (?) adversary and a much treasured ally back through time together, to blow up the helicopter the earlier version of the character in question is travelling in...

In case you aren't confused enough already, the 'former adversary' is both my character's offspring (from a previous incarnation), born after an illicit affair with a Chaos soldier, and a God who also claims he needs to complete his 'cycle' of being... (I did tell you that Shadows is not your average game !).

Somewhere along the line we're also supposed to be going to try out our plan for disposing of the land mutant bugs on one of their smaller hives, before notching it up to try and destroy the uber hive that's starting to form. (Which I am guessing may involve another stupidly long combat session).

Meanwhile my character, Lilithai, is engaged in sniping with words at one of her colleagues, their medico and former commander Robyn, (whilst Lili's 'daughter' seems to be turning into a gibbering mess) because she has all sorts of unresolved mental and emotional issues that Robyn just happens to be copping the brunt of right now because her alternate self assaulted Lili's daughter a while ago...

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In Vampire we have a new Prince. Elijah has invited the Prince to go on a double date with him to a Masonic Ball in November, in aid of a charity that will help house and feed the homeless during the winter period.

The bugs in the sewers seem to be evolving into bigger bugs and are eating more people in the process. It feels like it will be only a matter of time before they are splashed all over the mortal media. We're just hoping they don't develop a preference for eating non-human life forms like us, which seems like it could be a trend at the moment. Some characters did go and try to kick sh*t out of the bugs during the last Court, but we're not sure yet how successful the attack on them was.

Apparently, too, the police in the city are worried about some stolen fireworks, and rumour has it they may be a bit more effective than your average sparklers and rockets...

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Please remember, it's only a game... All this is fiction.

Have a nice Halloween everyone ! Happy Samhain !

What's Happening in the Games 4th October 2006

I am reminded by recent Camarilla events that there is a fine line between gaming and reality, and that delineating the two is hard for some and impossible for others. There is currently an anti-semitic thread progressing on one of the Camarilla lists which would be wholly offensive to me if that line was indistinct. Even though I know what is fact and what is fiction I am concerned by the thread in question, not least because of the impression it might give of the society were it to be quoted out of context.

For several years I was in a lead position within the Camarilla where such matters were daily of great concern to me and I was frequently having to fire-fight media misquotes and mis-representations. I still occasionally have cause to be so involved as a result of my real-life job, though in different contexts.

It annoys me when people protest "...but it's only a game, no-one could take that seriously..." and similar phrases. People can and do take such matters seriously, and I personally feel we have a responsibility to police our own houses. People build policy based on perception, and if we give an incorrect perception of ourselves to others we end up with persons who find it harder to distinguish reality from game play / fiction instigating policies on our behalf to 'protect us' from ourselves. (Don't even think about getting me started on the UK's current human rights policies versus our 'anti-terrorism' laws !).


Anyway, besides that, I am still playing two other games. In WFRP our characaters managed to solve the murders mentioned in a previous entry. I won't go into detail, since it is a published scenario and I would hate to spoil the playing of it for others by giving too much away. Suffice to say we got our **ses severely kicked in the process. Thank goodness we were working for a temple and got free healing afterwards ! We even came out of it with some profit ! I enjoyed the session a lot.

In Shadows things move slowly. I was pleased with how our GM responded to my earlier post about Shadows, and I owe him a private email because hotmail ate my last attempt at a response to his comment here. I can't honestly remember what happened last session. I'm sure it was significant, but my brain has fallen out today. I'm really busy at work and nothing is sticking in my head presently. When I remember, then I will tell you all.