Gloria Mundi Update
Four more sessions of Gloria Mundi. Wow, where did the time go? That means, if you're keeping track, that counting Wreckage and Song of the Deep, as well as the two sessions of The Silence of Time when Fred's character cameoed, as well as the eight sessions of the demo chronicle from whence this all sprung, tonight marks the 48th session of the chronicle. That means we'll have 52 total. That's pretty damned good, if I do say so m'self.
(Now, my Werewolf game might well break 100 before we're done, but that's a weekly game and it's been running longer.)
I'll post more thoughts about the chronicle in general when it actually ends. For now...
One of the things I like to do once in a while is run vignettes, one for each character in a chronicle. It gives each character a little face-time with the Storyteller, lets them work on aspects of their development that are either crucial to the chronicle or that I think are interesting and need to be explored, and allows the players to do some role-playing without having to talk over one another. Now, the possible drawback is that I'm focusing on one person out of five for a while, and that if a player doesn't have much in the way of Intiative, s/he probably isn't going to last very long within the vignette.
Anyway, I wrote up some little vignettes after my exam in Motor Speech/Dysphagia today, and started the game off with those. The session started in the morning of 5/2/05, three days away from whatever happens on 5/5/05, and the morning after the cabal got, as the nerds say, pwned by Dexter Nuremberg.
Whew.
Well, Knit was taken into custody and Ogma asked to give her a quick evaluation. Of course, he used magic to link minds (and they both used One Mind, Two Thoughts to keep talking while their minds chatted), and in the end, they decided that she'd ask for a lawyer and probably plead not guilty by reason of insanity (which Ogma supported)...if it ever goes to trial at all. Adepts of Space are hard to keep behind bars.
Tyrrhenus met with Chain and told him about the third signatory of the Secret Concord (Seers, remember?). They discussed options and Chain said that he could remain a Councilor under Tyrrhenus' Hierarchy, and that the White Putnams would be happy to have a good Catholic in charge rather than a heathen like the Nemean.
Isis went to the Temple and dug out the book that had mentioned Abyssal Watchtowers once upon a time. The mage who wrote it posited that everything in the Supernal and the Fallen Worlds has a reflection in the Abyss, and that the Abyss isn't a vast ocean but a razor-thin but infinitely long mirror between them. As such, the Watchtowers have reflections there, and he even knew the name of one: The Aenigma Temporis. It might be possible, the author felt, to sign one's name on the inversion of a Watchtower in the script of the Abyss (which was apparently what was in Knit's head) and thus move one's Awakening to the Abyss. Isis felt a shudder, and left to a ringing phone.
Tyrrhenus, on Chain's advice, was headed out to see Hydra, to ask for her support and to find out what was happening with the Sentinels' change-up. He collected Niamh, Isis and Ogma (Knit still in jail, after all) and went out to Gloucester. There, Hydra received them and told them that the Gravediggers were going to sit this one out - their mission was to safeguard the living and the dead and the boundaries thereof, and the Nemean had made it clear that he didn't trust the cabal when he removed Eve and Hades (both Gravediggers) from the Sentinels. Hydra also mentioned that she probably wasn't to live much longer, and needed to either marry or adopt someone in order to pass the cabal along a family line. She said that the Shadow Chorus was the real unknown quantity here, and that Ogma probably knew more about them than he thought - but his cabal (that is, the PCs) was his greatest resource for answering these questions. She offered them a room for the night at Windham Manor to discuss their options.
The next step, they think, is to talk with the Shadow Chorus and see where they stand. And, perhaps, to feel out some of the more reasonable members of the Ebon Noose. But time's catching up.
(Now, my Werewolf game might well break 100 before we're done, but that's a weekly game and it's been running longer.)
I'll post more thoughts about the chronicle in general when it actually ends. For now...
One of the things I like to do once in a while is run vignettes, one for each character in a chronicle. It gives each character a little face-time with the Storyteller, lets them work on aspects of their development that are either crucial to the chronicle or that I think are interesting and need to be explored, and allows the players to do some role-playing without having to talk over one another. Now, the possible drawback is that I'm focusing on one person out of five for a while, and that if a player doesn't have much in the way of Intiative, s/he probably isn't going to last very long within the vignette.
Anyway, I wrote up some little vignettes after my exam in Motor Speech/Dysphagia today, and started the game off with those. The session started in the morning of 5/2/05, three days away from whatever happens on 5/5/05, and the morning after the cabal got, as the nerds say, pwned by Dexter Nuremberg.
- Ogma, while at work, got handed a matchbook by a cop he couldn't quite place for a bar called "Last Chance." He popped over on his lunch break ("Do I have time for that?" "You're a Master of Space." "Oh, yeah.") and found, amongst the graffiti on the bathroom wall, riddles. These were: "If a man steals your eyes and looks into a bright light, do you go blind?" "3 of 5, or 3 of 4 before the Fall, will help you." And "What is the labyrinth, and where are the walls, and who are the beasts that wander its halls?" Ogma took these and went back to work, puzzling over them.
- Knit went to church, and randomly (hah) chose the church where Sebastien Licavoli, Tyrrhenus' brother, is the pastor. She gave confession ("I'll buy you dinner if this is the weirdest thing I've ever heard, but you're up against some stiff competition", he said). After she'd finished, including telling him about murdering her parents, he advised her to turn herself in. But it became a moot point soon thereafter. The police arrived, and busted her for killing her parents five years ago. Apparently, some forensic evidence that hadn't existed previously had turned up, and a random event in Chicago about a month ago, in which Tyrrhenus had been called and mentioned Knit's real name (Kathy Veldmont), had led the cops in Chicago to contact the cops in Florida...big mess. Anyway, Knit surrendered, probably in part because she knew she could leave whenever she wanted (she did stick her magical knife and scissors into a Pocket Realm first).
- Niamh got a call from Aurem of the Brotherhood of the Ineffable Truth, and he asked to take Agdos and look into some weird spiritual residue in the Fens. She did, and looked back in time properly to witness this bit of weirdness, which explained how the mud got on her floor that time. About that time, Reigna of the Gravediggers wandered up and chatted with the two mages a bit, letting them know an interesting development: Two of his cabal-mates, the Sentinels Hades and Eve, had been asked to step down as Sentinels. The Nemean, apparently, didn't trust them anymore.
- Meanwhile, Isis went out to the Mysterium mages who had trained her, the Sanguine Laurel. Now, if you don't have Boston Unveiled, the Laurel is a hereditary cabal and very much supportive of the Nemean. When Isis got there, Ranae, the youngest member, advised her quickly to claim the Right of Hospitality, which she did. Numa, the leader, grudgingly allowed her in, and Isis learned that Numa, Blanchefleur and Hrothwulf (the other three members, and Ranae's uncle, mother and husband, respectively) had been asked to become Sentinels. Ranae was worried for their safety, and Isis couldn't fault her. Isis stayed around a while to use the cabal's library, looking up the strange runes that she saw in Knit's head. She eventually came to the conclusion that they were inversions of Atlantean runes, and not knowing where else to look for such things (her mentor Thanatos recommended the Shadow Chorus, but that's tall order) went to the Atlantean Temple to look up all things Abyssal.
- Tyrrhenus went to his office and found a note from Ti Malice, his mentor, saying that she'd gone home temporarily. He also had a message from an unidentified woman wanting to look for "a relative." He called the number back and talked to the woman, who said that her relative, Destine Prezau, had lived in Roxbury and thus might have run up against some bad times during the riots. Tyrrhenus did a few quick searches and found a picture of Ms. Prezau from some years back - evidently she worked at Danvers as a custodian before it closed. (Go find her in Chapter Three of Boston Unveiled, and then ruminate on her significance in my chronicles. I'll wait.)
Whew.
Well, Knit was taken into custody and Ogma asked to give her a quick evaluation. Of course, he used magic to link minds (and they both used One Mind, Two Thoughts to keep talking while their minds chatted), and in the end, they decided that she'd ask for a lawyer and probably plead not guilty by reason of insanity (which Ogma supported)...if it ever goes to trial at all. Adepts of Space are hard to keep behind bars.
Tyrrhenus met with Chain and told him about the third signatory of the Secret Concord (Seers, remember?). They discussed options and Chain said that he could remain a Councilor under Tyrrhenus' Hierarchy, and that the White Putnams would be happy to have a good Catholic in charge rather than a heathen like the Nemean.
Isis went to the Temple and dug out the book that had mentioned Abyssal Watchtowers once upon a time. The mage who wrote it posited that everything in the Supernal and the Fallen Worlds has a reflection in the Abyss, and that the Abyss isn't a vast ocean but a razor-thin but infinitely long mirror between them. As such, the Watchtowers have reflections there, and he even knew the name of one: The Aenigma Temporis. It might be possible, the author felt, to sign one's name on the inversion of a Watchtower in the script of the Abyss (which was apparently what was in Knit's head) and thus move one's Awakening to the Abyss. Isis felt a shudder, and left to a ringing phone.
Tyrrhenus, on Chain's advice, was headed out to see Hydra, to ask for her support and to find out what was happening with the Sentinels' change-up. He collected Niamh, Isis and Ogma (Knit still in jail, after all) and went out to Gloucester. There, Hydra received them and told them that the Gravediggers were going to sit this one out - their mission was to safeguard the living and the dead and the boundaries thereof, and the Nemean had made it clear that he didn't trust the cabal when he removed Eve and Hades (both Gravediggers) from the Sentinels. Hydra also mentioned that she probably wasn't to live much longer, and needed to either marry or adopt someone in order to pass the cabal along a family line. She said that the Shadow Chorus was the real unknown quantity here, and that Ogma probably knew more about them than he thought - but his cabal (that is, the PCs) was his greatest resource for answering these questions. She offered them a room for the night at Windham Manor to discuss their options.
The next step, they think, is to talk with the Shadow Chorus and see where they stand. And, perhaps, to feel out some of the more reasonable members of the Ebon Noose. But time's catching up.