Musings and Ravings

Wednesday Night Game Report – Continuum RPG Session 3 January 5, 2017

Last night, the Wednesday night gaming group met up for their regularly scheduled game session. This was the first game session of the new year. They continued on with the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG. Here are the game session notes. You can read about the previous session of the game by following the link. This blog entry is relatively long, so I’ve decided to put it behind a cut so that folks who don’t want to read any detailed rpg posts don’t have to do so.

CHARACTERS:

Kiera Marshall (Donna Winston) – Registered Nurse
Michael Randolph (David Winston) – Archaeology Professor
Samantha Aridanes (Kendall Scott) – Language Student
Maureen (Minnie) Bronstein (Crystal White) – Bookstore Clerk

Thursday, May 10th, 2001 AD (Level)

At Giuseppe’s, Samantha Aridanes is the last to arrive, and therefore she ends up footing the bill for supper. Simon Jesser, their chrony, comments that it’s ironic that the poor language student is the one who has to pay for supper this night, and Michael Randolph tells the others that he’ll foot the bill. Jaana informs him that he will not, as it’s Samantha’s “duty” to do so. Samantha agrees, as she was the last to arrive at Giuseppe’s, and her mentor nods approvingly.

Over the course of dinner, being careful about being heard discussing the subject, the spanners discuss the nature of Frag(mentation) to the limits that Span Ones can understand the term, and Jaana explains that the frag in this case can only be remove through the use of hypnosis, which she will take care of when they return to the Corner. The player characters and their chronies enjoy the rest of the meal in peace, although Kiera has the strangest feeling that they’re being observed. Jaana tells her that they are, but doesn’t elaborate on the point. After dinner, the characters head back for the corner so that Jaana can take care of the matter of Samantha and Maureen’s frag. The various characters retired for the night.

The next morning dawned bright and clear, though the threat of snow was in the air. Maureen joked about spanning Up to find out how much snow would fall and then report back to the characters, but Simon admonished her desire as being “petty”. Jaana chided him, and told Maureen that she could do so if she wished. She did, spanning Up, and then returned to inform the chronies that there was going to be 10 centimeters of snow. At Jaana’s look, she jotted down some notes in her spanbook. The player chronies who needed to head to work and their day routines did so, and as Kiera grabbed her clean nurse’s uniform to take with her to work, she noticed that there was a second nurse’s uniform, also hers, in the cupboard – but this one had blood on it. A small piece of paper was in the jacket pocket, and the curious Kiera took the note out and read it:

“A taste of what’s to come, sad to say. You’ll thank me for it, later. Now put the note back!” -K.

She dutifully put the note back in the pocket, made a quick note in her spanbook, and then headed for the hospital.

The day proceeded uneventfully for the most part for the player chronies. Samantha is going about her business at Carleton University, spending some time in the MacOdrum Library doing research on some ancient dialect of Latin that her supervising professor has referred her to. She is interrupted by the appearance of a dark-haired, 20-something young man wearing casual campus clothes, though she notes that he’s wearing a pair of loafers that don’t seem to fit his wardrobe though she’s not sure why. He asks if she’s Samantha Aridanes, and when she confirms that she is, says that he has a message for her. As he proffers her an envelope, she asks him his name, but he says that’s not important; she refuses to take the note until he tells her his name, and he says that he’s Edward Leftworth. She doesn’t recognise the name[, but he mutters that, “You will.”] When she refuses to take the note until he tells her more, he says that it’s her loss, and steps back around the stacks. She tells him to wait, but when he doesn’t reappear, she goes around the stacks to find he’s not there.

Maureen is going about her normal work day business at Taraquin Books, and heads back to the stockroom at the rear of the structure to get some books to restock the shelves. She is interrupted by the appearance of a dark-haired, 20-something young man wearing casual clothes [but she doesn’t notice he’s wearing a pair of loafers that don’t seem to fit his wardrobe] at the door to the stock room. She tells him he’s not supposed to be there, but he ignores her and asks of she Minnie Bronstein. When she asks who wants to know, and repeats that he’s not supposed to be there, he tells her that he’s got a message for her, and proffers her an envelope. She asks who it’s from, but he ignores her. Her boss, Carol Hayes, calls to her, asking if she’s got the book that the customer is waiting for, and the man, obviously startled, moves out of the storeroom. Grabbing the book, and heading towards the shopfront, Maureen calls out to him, but as she re-enters the shop area proper, there’s no sign of the man or his envelope.

Thursday, May 11th, 2001 AD 3:20:19 pm (Up): Kiera’s work shift at the hospital runs the gamut of the everyday life of a nurse, and is a relatively calm day, without a lot of trauma cases involved. However, at the end of her duty shift, Kiera ran with the others to greet an EMT vehicle that had brought in a shooting victim. She realised immediately who the victim was: Violet Jones, and she was definitely dead…but it was an *older* version of the character! One of the EMTs, Harrison Davis, told her that the woman had been found at the University of Ottawa Archaeology Department’s storeroom around 3:00 pm that afternoon, but that she died on route to the hospital. Kiera notices on the EMT’s log that the Time of Death (ToD) is listed as 05/11/2001/3:16:42.

Thursday, May 11th, 2001 AD 2:58:16 pm (Down): Michael Randolph is having a rough day of it at the University of Ottawa. Dr. Angela Poirier, head of the Archaeology Department, has discovered that someone has stolen two bones of an Ankylosaurus that is being used to teach students the rudiments of fossil structure, and she’s not happy about it. Since it seems that Michael was the last to access the two bones on May 9th, 2001 at 10:45 pm (something that he denies doing), she wants to know what he’s done with them, and is incensed when he tells her he’s got no idea what she’s talking about. They are interrupted by one of the security guards, who tells them that there’s been a shooting in one of the labs of the department. The EMTs are on their way. Angela tells Michael to come with her, and directs the security guard to wait for the EMTs and bring them along when they arrive, and Michael grabs a first aid kit. When they reach the lab, Michael is shocked to recognise the woman lying in a pool of blood in the lab – it is Violet Jones, but an older version of her! As Michael quickly scans about the lab before jotting down a note in his spanbook, he is surprised to see several figures skulking around the corner of one of the lab cabinets – and recognises both Samantha and Kiera [and he makes another note in his spanbook, though it may or may not be relevant]….

Last night’s game session of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet campaign was a lot of fun for me, and highlighted some of the elements of the time travel roleplaying game, although the player characters may not know it (Yet). 🙂 While there was no combat of any kind in this session, the players were dealing with both level (mundane) and temporal issues, the main one of which they realise. There were also some interesting little sub-plots going on as well, and both Donna and Kendall are really curious as to what’s going on with a couple of these elements.

Overall, it was a pleasant and highly enjoyable game session of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG, and a nice way to start gaming for 2017. I’m quite looking forward to the next session of this one.

Wednesday Night Game Report – Continuum RPG Session 2 December 15, 2016

Last night, the Wednesday night gaming group met up for their regularly scheduled game session. They continued on with the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG. Here are the game session notes. You can read about the previous session of the game by following the link. This blog entry is relatively short, but I’ve decided to put it behind a cut so that folks who don’t want to read any detailed rpg posts don’t have to do so.

CHARACTERS:
Kiera Marshall (Donna) – Registered Nurse
Michael Randolph (DavidW) – Archaeology Professor
Samantha Aridanes (Kendall) – Language Student
Maureen (Minnie) Bronstein (Crystal) – Bookstore Clerk

Thursday, May 10th, 2001 AD (Level)

Jaana, their mentor, assured Kiera Marshall, Samantha Aridanes, and Maureen Bronstein that they would be fine, but that Frag(mentation) does take some time to get used to. In the meantime, she instructed them to see what they could figure out in terms of how they’d been fragged, and told Michael Randolph that he was expected to help them out. Jaana said that she had to be somewhen else at the moment, and after the characters expressed some fear about the situation, Jaana reassured them they’d be fine. She’d see them later, and then she spanned out.

A bit bewildered, the four chronies tried to get a “feel” for when the fragging had occurred, but nothing came to them. Simon Jesser, the other One living at the Corner, spanned in from his job as a burger flipper, and heard what had happened to the characters. Kiera and the others were still a bit baffled over what needed to be done, but Simone gave them the clue they needed: First and Fourth Maxims (Information Is All and Measure Twice, Cut Once. The chronies went out and did some Level spanning around (although Michael was the first one to span Down during the sequence), and the characters came to realise what had happened. During her earlier spanning, Kiera had accidentally fragged Samantha and Maureen by appearing in places they occupied, where she had not been with them in their Age. “Another fine mess I made!” Kiera said, but Samantha and Minnie didn’t blame her, though they wondered how they were going to get rid of the frag.

Jaana reappeared, and asked her Ones if they had recorded all their spans in their log books. Both Michael and Samantha had guilty looks on their faces, and Jaan admonished them, and then watched as they made their chicken scratches in the log books. She asked if they’d figured out what happened to frag the three, and when they said they did, Jaana asked if they knew how to make things right. Kiera said she thought she did, and at the mentor’s urging, explained what she meant. Jaana nodded, saying that she and the others (except Michael, who was not involved) had a lot of work ahead of them. After a couple of Gemini incidents for Kiera and both Maureen and Samantha doing some slipshanking, the frag suffered by Maureen, Samantha, and Kiera was set to rights. When they returned Level, Jaana admonished Kiera once again for inflicting the frag on her fellow spanners. Simon, who was also present, joked that he was glad that hadn’t happened to him. Jaana stopped him from speaking more, stating angrily, “Further information is not available here!”.

By this time, the characters were hungry as suppertime had rolled around. Jaana decided to test the spanners, and said that she’d meet them at their favourite pizza place, Giuseppe’s. “Last one there pays for all!” she said, and then spanned away. Simon flickered out almost immediately after her, smirking at Michael and the three women. Kiera commented that it was another test, wasn’t it?, to which Michael replied that it always was. And then he spanned away.

Last night’s session of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG was a lot of fun, and the players seemed to enjoy themselves. There were a couple of times where both Donna and Kendall had some trouble coming to terms with temporal situation matters, but talking in character to their mentor rather than asked the GM about it was more fun for the two players, and Kendall said afterwards that she felt more capable in regards to those issues that she had. All of the players agreed that they’re having an interesting time with the game, even if they get a few headaches from having to start thinking four-dimensionally. Donna said she never realised that what she had done earlier would cause the frag, and we talked about the As/As Nots, and all four players got even bigger headaches!

Overall, a fun game session of the Continuum RPG, and I’m looking forward to continuing the game. Not sure if we’ll play another session this year, but it would be nice to wrap up the Wednesday night gaming year that way.

Wednesday Night Game Report – Continuum RPG Session 1 December 1, 2016

Last night, the Wednesday night gaming group met up for their regularly scheduled game session. They started their campaign of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG. Here are the game session notes. You can read about the session of character creation by following the link. This blog entry is relatively short, but I’ve decided to put it behind a cut so that folks who don’t want to read any detailed rpg posts don’t have to.

CHARACTERS:
Kiera Marshall (Donna) – Registered Nurse
Michael Randolph (DavidW) – Archaeology Professor
Samantha Aridanes (Kendall) – Language Student
Maureen (Minnie) Bronstein (Crystal) – Bookstore Clerk

Thursday, May 10th, 2001 AD

The players begin with an introduction to the world of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet RPG, learn some of the basic mechanics of the game, proceed through some of the Continuum world Glossary, and partake in several samples of combat that teach them the basic mechanics of the time travelling game (but not Time Combat). And how deadly the combat system is.

The place: The city of Ottawa, in the province of Ontario, in the country of Canada, in the early Aquarian Era. The Corner is King’s Lament, located in Ottawa ca. 1984-2006. The corner is mentored by one Jaana. The time: Thursday, May 10th, 2001 AD. The player characters are Kiera Marshall (Donna), Michael Randolph (DavidW), Samantha Aridanes (Kendall), and Maureen (“Minnie”) Bronstein (Crystal). The universe of the Continuum is one that is all about Society and working together, but also about learning how to time travel. Hopefully, this is the beginning of a series of long stories of the Lives of these former Levellers…

The player characters were going about their normal business of the day when they each spotted a relatively attractive young woman watching them. Before they could get to her, the young woman disappeared (around a corner). Later, back at the King’s Lament (their Corner), the characters found the young woman waiting for them, talking with their Mentor, Jaana. While Jaana warned her to be careful how she handled the situation, the young woman told the characters that her name is Violet Jones, and that they have to protect her younger self from “what is to come”. Both Kiera and Maureen noted down stuff in their Yet, and Jaana admonished Michael and Samantha to do so as well. Samantha complained that it’s not her fault that she’s not “up and at ’em” with her Span and Yet notes, but Jaana merely says that she’ll learn better. The characters were baffled, and so went about their business after Violet left, although Kiera decided to span Levelly about a bit and see what she could learn. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary, but as she spanned back in to the common room, she felt nauseous and fatigued, as did Samantha and Maureen (Minnie) – they’ve been fragged!

The Wednesday night players had a simply marvellous time playing the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet last night, with all four players commenting that it really is a remarkably simple game system and that the mechanics are quite neat. DavidM and Kendall really liked the mechanics for handling Span and Yet, though both added they felt that it would take them some time to handle certain aspects of the two cards devoted to those elements. Donna, Kendall, and Crystal are now curious as to how they got fragged by the spanning about of Donna’s character, but that will be revealed in the next session of game play.

Overall, a lovely night of Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet play, and I look forward to another session next week (and I write that down in my Yet!) 🙂