Mammoth AP report catchup
So I've fallen a little behind on the AP reports. I'm still kinda getting in the swing of things for class, but I'm sticking to my guns and doing at least a what worked/what didn't for each of the games. So, without further ado.
Mage 10/4
The good: We got the work of moving over to mage fully done, at least.
The bad: Getting everything transferred over took way longer than I was hoping it would. Not in the sense that people took a long time, more in the sense that my expectations were unreasonable. Everyone had to pick rotes and there's a LOT of rotes to choose from. And we only had two books. I'm going to get my own copy of the book (I'm running the damn game, I should have a copy of the book), for further smoothness.
By the time we got started, the energy to play kinda wasn't there. It got dark and people got tired. I also think the couches, as comfy as they are, may not be the best place to play the game. Next game I'm moving folks to the table, so people can face each other. Also it's a bit brighter in the kitchen.
I really failed to prepare adequately for the game. I'm kind of glad that things didn't progress too far, because now I can rework the parts the party didn't get to so it's not quite as lame. I've already spent a lot of time thinking about it and I've come up with some twists that should make things much less stale than they would have been.
The ugly: The threat of intra-party conflict has reared its ugly head, both in character and out. I'm not opposed to conflict within the party in general, but there are ways that it can be interesting in game, and there are ways it can just be painful. And out of game, it's just plain bad. Fortunately things seem to have gotten sorted out, but I'm going to be cautious, and try to figure out how I as a GM can bring the party together.
L5R 10/5
Positives: We finished the tournament! Everyone managed to impress a clan, but no one took home the top prize. The scenes in the forest for people who got lost were really well done for being improvised (or at least I assume they were; since buffaloraven had no way of knowing who would get lost)
Less than positives: I was really bummed about losing the final competition, since I was in first place going into it. Had I known more about the competiton, I would have realized that I really never had a chance in the final competition and wouldn't have gotten my hopes up about it. That an NPC won in the end doesn't bother me however; The spectacular nature of my failure just sort of caught me by surprise. I was over it by halfway through the game however.
SAS 10/7
Positives: I'm feeling a bit more comfortable in the game. I think next session I may even throw out some panel type descriptions, if I can think of something appropriate.
I loved the exposition scene where the PCs came together to discuss what we knew. We've got a great back-and-forth and the PCs really mesh as a team, albeit a somewhat... colorful one.
I was pleased with myself for immediately jumping on the realization that my contact Ben had been subjected to memnezine just like the rest of us. Nothing huge, it was just a little, "Aha!" moment for me.
Negatives: I'm drawing a blank here.
L5R 10/12
Positives: buffaloraven really went all out with the powerpoint for winter court. I'm really looking forward to future sessions.
I loved how people chained their scenes together in little ways. Yoshi waylaid a caravan under Nadu's orders, which lead to Al-Saleen going on a search for the "bandits", which lead to Shiko placating the peasants after an Akodo killed a peasant during the bandit search. I'm going to see if I can swing something like this next week, as long as I can pull it off without it feeling forced.
The scene economy is fun. I also like how the rewards are designed to be cool things that don't contribute to insight, such as specialties, kiho, kata, and advantages. Players tend to ignore these to try and get to the next insight rank, but they really are cool and fun, so I'm glad we're getting to play around with them.
Mage 10/4
The good: We got the work of moving over to mage fully done, at least.
The bad: Getting everything transferred over took way longer than I was hoping it would. Not in the sense that people took a long time, more in the sense that my expectations were unreasonable. Everyone had to pick rotes and there's a LOT of rotes to choose from. And we only had two books. I'm going to get my own copy of the book (I'm running the damn game, I should have a copy of the book), for further smoothness.
By the time we got started, the energy to play kinda wasn't there. It got dark and people got tired. I also think the couches, as comfy as they are, may not be the best place to play the game. Next game I'm moving folks to the table, so people can face each other. Also it's a bit brighter in the kitchen.
I really failed to prepare adequately for the game. I'm kind of glad that things didn't progress too far, because now I can rework the parts the party didn't get to so it's not quite as lame. I've already spent a lot of time thinking about it and I've come up with some twists that should make things much less stale than they would have been.
The ugly: The threat of intra-party conflict has reared its ugly head, both in character and out. I'm not opposed to conflict within the party in general, but there are ways that it can be interesting in game, and there are ways it can just be painful. And out of game, it's just plain bad. Fortunately things seem to have gotten sorted out, but I'm going to be cautious, and try to figure out how I as a GM can bring the party together.
L5R 10/5
Positives: We finished the tournament! Everyone managed to impress a clan, but no one took home the top prize. The scenes in the forest for people who got lost were really well done for being improvised (or at least I assume they were; since buffaloraven had no way of knowing who would get lost)
Less than positives: I was really bummed about losing the final competition, since I was in first place going into it. Had I known more about the competiton, I would have realized that I really never had a chance in the final competition and wouldn't have gotten my hopes up about it. That an NPC won in the end doesn't bother me however; The spectacular nature of my failure just sort of caught me by surprise. I was over it by halfway through the game however.
SAS 10/7
Positives: I'm feeling a bit more comfortable in the game. I think next session I may even throw out some panel type descriptions, if I can think of something appropriate.
I loved the exposition scene where the PCs came together to discuss what we knew. We've got a great back-and-forth and the PCs really mesh as a team, albeit a somewhat... colorful one.
I was pleased with myself for immediately jumping on the realization that my contact Ben had been subjected to memnezine just like the rest of us. Nothing huge, it was just a little, "Aha!" moment for me.
Negatives: I'm drawing a blank here.
L5R 10/12
Positives: buffaloraven really went all out with the powerpoint for winter court. I'm really looking forward to future sessions.
I loved how people chained their scenes together in little ways. Yoshi waylaid a caravan under Nadu's orders, which lead to Al-Saleen going on a search for the "bandits", which lead to Shiko placating the peasants after an Akodo killed a peasant during the bandit search. I'm going to see if I can swing something like this next week, as long as I can pull it off without it feeling forced.
The scene economy is fun. I also like how the rewards are designed to be cool things that don't contribute to insight, such as specialties, kiho, kata, and advantages. Players tend to ignore these to try and get to the next insight rank, but they really are cool and fun, so I'm glad we're getting to play around with them.