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<blockquote data-quote="Echolocation" data-source="post: 8689508" data-attributes="member: 7011911"><p>Sorry about the previous, non-linear post. I omitted a recap of two short sessions we had, which have now been edited in.</p><p></p><p><strong>Session 79</strong></p><p><em>Courtesy of Ella's player</em></p><p></p><p>Infiltrating a top secret Obscurati meeting in another dimension using the bodies of unwilling Ob officers… Not the easiest of tasks to be sure, and yet - despite everything - we’d been doing surprisingly well!</p><p></p><p>Sure, someone else was running around killing Obscurati and that person wasn’t us. And yes, Macbannin knew something fishy was going on but… overall? <strong>Not bad</strong>!</p><p>…Despite our team name.</p><p></p><p>Of course, “not bad” means “far too well” in Zeitgeist, so it was time to throw a spanner in the works. Or <em>three </em>spanners! Because why not?</p><p></p><p>The first spanner came in the form of Angharad. Having sat through boring speech after boring meeting after <em>not-quite-so-boring</em> demonstration, he was ready to spice things up a little. After all, it’s not like we were there to help the Obscurati. <strong>Right</strong>, <em>Ella</em>?</p><p></p><p>The last round of boring speeches Angharad had endured - two of them presented by Ella and Erskine - finished with a word from Nicodemus: as the immortal Ob leader explained that… while the world might be a truly naughty word up place filled with foul people committing countless atrocities, the Obscurati’s own atrocities had a chance to fix all that! So the next - and perhaps final - round of voting was very important. A process that could determine the fate of the <em><strong>entire world</strong></em> - and eight other worlds besides!</p><p></p><p><strong>No pressure</strong>.</p><p></p><p>Han, Nicodemus, Grappa and Erksine all voted for the MAP proposal, yet Colossus still managed to take the lead by the time Team BAD came around. Ella/Livia’s vote went to MAP, as did Lisandra/Oscan’s and John/Xavier’s. Which left MAP one vote ahead of Colossus and Angharad with the final vote in the room.</p><p></p><p>Enter Spanner #1.</p><p></p><p>Ken Don [controlled by Angharad] stepped up to the board, took his vote… and placed it with Colossus, creating a tie. Because what’s an extradimensional secret meeting to determine the fate of the world without a little chaos?</p><p></p><p>Nicodemus forestalled the imminent uproar as he commended everyone on “voting their conscience” and began speechifying over the sound of gas filling the room’s lanterns. Lisandra was the first to notice, shrugging off the effects of the soothing blue glow that was so very similar to the light she’d fallen victim to in Knutpara. Everyone else though began to feel remarkably calm.</p><p></p><p>A quick kick to Angharad’s shin disabused him of his newfound peace, and John and Ella eventually followed suit, leaving the true Ob officers in an agreeable daze as Nicodemus invited the Watchmakers and MAP supporters to follow him out of the room while the Colossus advocates stayed behind. With nothing more than paranoia and vague unease to go on, we followed his directions, leaving Angharad to hobnob with wannabe tyrants.</p><p></p><p>In the foyer, Lisandra, Ella and John found the second spanner: a giant, roiling mass of spirits comprising the Obscurati’s oft-mentioned but never-before-seen Ghost Council. A spectral monstrosity that Nicodemus very calmly proposed setting on the Colossus supporters in the theatre hall. A suggestion that nearly everyone present wholeheartedly agreed with.</p><p></p><p><em>Sodding Murderati.</em></p><p></p><p>The only exceptions were the people that weren’t even supposed to be there: undercover Team BAD.</p><p></p><p>Ella/Livia spoke up first, trying to make an eloquent case for the Obscurati not murdering half of their own people, while Lisandra frantically tried to think of a way to extricate Angharad from the potential slaughter. Seeing Ella’s pleas falling on death ears, the oracle - in her guise as ruthless murderer Oscan - stepped up to the plate and rebuked those present for advocating peace while proposing murder! Berating them for betraying the ideals of the MAP proposal so easily. With her final denouncement, she span toward the theatre hall doors and demanded to be let in. For if the Colossus advocates were going to die, then someone from the MAP proposal should stand by their bloody grand ideals and die with them!</p><p></p><p>Her ploy to get to Angharad was foiled by the third spanner in our increasingly complicated evening, as Erskine stepped forward and spoke in a horribly familiar voice: “For those who do not know me, my name is Benedict Pemberton.”</p><p></p><p>The dwarven duplicant’s chest opened, revealing a ticking bomb, as the dragon-in-dwarf’s-clothing stated that while he really hated the Ob, there were some present who he hated more: <em>Team BAD</em>.</p><p></p><p>And then he pointed at <strong>us</strong>. Because of course he did.</p><p></p><p><em>Stupid Gradiax</em>.</p><p></p><p>Chaos ensued: Ob officers panicking, Ella trying to disable the bomb, Han Jierre vanishing, John being very confused about who to shoot, the Ghost Council floating toward the theatre hall full of blissfully unaware Colossus supporters, and Nicodemus watching it all with calm interest.</p><p></p><p>Through the theatre hall doors, Angharad heard the muffled commotion and decided to take advantage of the calming effect in his room to coerce Catherine Romana into his Absurdist’s Web. An endeavour that was going fairly well until a scream from the foyer interrupted.</p><p></p><p>For in Lisandra’s haste to get to the theatre doors, she’d stood in the way of the Ghost Council, and the ghosts had no qualms about sucking out her life force as they drifted by. The oracle didn’t back down though, enduring the energy drain as well as Nicodemus’ irritatingly calm comments with only terse replies. Their one-sided conversation was interrupted by a new voice: one coming from Nicodemus’ own mouth. A voice much more akin to that we’d heard upon first meeting Nicodemus’ current form: <em>Mr Mapple</em>.</p><p></p><p>The brief usurpation of his body by its true owner was enough to convince Nicodemus to leave, and with a snap of his fingers he vanished. Leaving us, a bomb, some fleeing Ob officers, and a room full of perturbed Colossus supporters. That perturbation soon turned to panic as the Ghost Council drifted through the theatre hall doors and began murdering people. Fortunately Angharad had finished ensnaring Catherine in his web and Dimension Door’d out of the room, leaving the Colossus members to their fate.</p><p></p><p>Almost simultaneously, eight Ob officers in the foyer were going up in flames, courtesy of John’s Flame Strike. The flames were intense enough to turn them to ash, as John made good on our orders to capture or kill when the opportunity presented itself.</p><p></p><p>Ella was… less than pleased though, as she suddenly found herself disabling a bomb for the benefit of nearly no one: with most of those who’d been present now dead or fled.</p><p></p><p>Angharad turned to one of the few remaining Ob - the eladrin Cula - and said “Sorry about this” as he grappled her. The Srasama follower slapped him away with burning hands though and John proceeded to fill her with bullets, while a plucky Ob officer likewise shot at Lisandra.</p><p></p><p>Drained of energy and now minus some flesh - but bonus a bullet! - Lisandra took one look at her attacker and sent him fleeing from the room with a spell.</p><p></p><p>In the midst of the flames and gunshots and screams, Ella decided she wanted none of it. No more death. No more unnecessary suffering and hate. With a final, bitter comment, she teleported through the theatre hall’s doors and out of sight.</p><p></p><p>Upon making it to those doors a few moments later, Lisandra found no sign of her friend, only an invisible barrier - as evidenced by Alloquacious the halfling slamming into it on his way out. The oracle didn’t have eyes for him though: instead searching for Ella amongst the chaos of fallen corpses, fleeing Colossus members, and writhing ghosts. She finally spotted her friend in the grasping arms of the Ghost Council: a tiny, ghostly tiefling who only gave her a brief look before stepping into the Council’s embrace.</p><p></p><p>As she vanished, so did something in Lisandra. But there was no time to consider that. No space for grief. She gave Alloquacious some curt advice to seek a vent and left him to his fate, turning back to Angharad and John’s struggle with Cula.</p><p></p><p>The eladrin had shot them both with lightning, slapped Angharad with fire hands, and stabbed the kineticist a few times, but John’s bullets were finally wearing her down, and it was with contempt that she spat: “I would sooner die to the beasts of this world than you fiends!” before teleporting away on 0 health. Probably condemning herself to a lonely death by blood loss…</p><p></p><p>With the final combatant gone, the constables found themselves in a bubble of calm - not counting the screams from the Ghost Council’s hunt. When John and Angharad questioned Lisandra on Ella's whereabouts, the spirit medium simply replied: “Ella’s already left”.</p><p></p><p>John immediately understood the morbid implication, but it took Angharad a moment longer. And when it clicked, it was only Lisandra’s reminder that dying here would prevent taking revenge later that kept the Mystic from flinging himself into the theatre.</p><p></p><p>His scream of rage echoed alongside the panicked cries of the Obscurati as he turned away, abandoning the Colossus members to their fate: unwitting actors in a theatre of death, following the unknown script of their immortal leader.</p><p></p><p>Yet the stage Team BAD find themselves upon now seems darker still: as they step from the lights of the palace into the shadows of the Bleak Gate. A place inhabited by monsters, filled with ghosts, and haunted by grief.</p><p></p><p>Will they escape from this nightmare realm? Or find themselves joining its spectral denizens?</p><p></p><p>Find out next time, on Zeitgeist.</p><p></p><p><strong>GM Notes</strong></p><p></p><p>Ella died! The lede is buried in this recap, but she teleported into theatre hall to save Colossus members. The ghost council took no pleasure in destroying her. The party assumes the soul of Livia and Ella was sent to Nem, as per the spell used to implant their minds into their hosts. However, the council saw use in Ella, who was ideologically predisposed to the Ob's goals. When the many hands of the council dragged Ella's soul inwards, it was for safe keeping. As the possessor of Livia and a Pardwight graduate of law, she is uniquely equipped to challenge King Aodhan for the throne. She'll return in Adventure Nine, as leader of the ghost council.</p><p></p><p>Admittedly, the ghost council was pumped up a bit. I gave it energy drain, knowing the party had several ways to outright protect themselves against negative energy and energy drain. However, Ella acted too hastily and was punished harshly for it. Out of character, the player admitted to knowing they could have prepared and survived, but that's not what she thought Ella would do in such a dire situation. Before this session, I also talked to this player about Ella's ideological alignment with the Ob. She thought the main reason Ella wouldn't join the Ob is because she trusts her friend's judgement over her own. I wouldn't normally bring a PC back as an evil character, but I think my players will enjoy it and I think it makes a huge amount of narrative sense. I'm looking forward to bringing her back and hearing (damn virtual games) my player's reactions...</p><p></p><p>Also, RIP sexy Harry Potter and Gran Guiscard. The two Ob agents who shacked up at the convocation. They had one last embrace before being incinerated by the John's pillar of fire.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]253392[/ATTACH]</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Echolocation, post: 8689508, member: 7011911"] Sorry about the previous, non-linear post. I omitted a recap of two short sessions we had, which have now been edited in. [B]Session 79[/B] [I]Courtesy of Ella's player[/I] Infiltrating a top secret Obscurati meeting in another dimension using the bodies of unwilling Ob officers… Not the easiest of tasks to be sure, and yet - despite everything - we’d been doing surprisingly well! Sure, someone else was running around killing Obscurati and that person wasn’t us. And yes, Macbannin knew something fishy was going on but… overall? [B]Not bad[/B]! …Despite our team name. Of course, “not bad” means “far too well” in Zeitgeist, so it was time to throw a spanner in the works. Or [I]three [/I]spanners! Because why not? The first spanner came in the form of Angharad. Having sat through boring speech after boring meeting after [I]not-quite-so-boring[/I] demonstration, he was ready to spice things up a little. After all, it’s not like we were there to help the Obscurati. [B]Right[/B], [I]Ella[/I]? The last round of boring speeches Angharad had endured - two of them presented by Ella and Erskine - finished with a word from Nicodemus: as the immortal Ob leader explained that… while the world might be a truly naughty word up place filled with foul people committing countless atrocities, the Obscurati’s own atrocities had a chance to fix all that! So the next - and perhaps final - round of voting was very important. A process that could determine the fate of the [I][B]entire world[/B][/I] - and eight other worlds besides! [B]No pressure[/B]. Han, Nicodemus, Grappa and Erksine all voted for the MAP proposal, yet Colossus still managed to take the lead by the time Team BAD came around. Ella/Livia’s vote went to MAP, as did Lisandra/Oscan’s and John/Xavier’s. Which left MAP one vote ahead of Colossus and Angharad with the final vote in the room. Enter Spanner #1. Ken Don [controlled by Angharad] stepped up to the board, took his vote… and placed it with Colossus, creating a tie. Because what’s an extradimensional secret meeting to determine the fate of the world without a little chaos? Nicodemus forestalled the imminent uproar as he commended everyone on “voting their conscience” and began speechifying over the sound of gas filling the room’s lanterns. Lisandra was the first to notice, shrugging off the effects of the soothing blue glow that was so very similar to the light she’d fallen victim to in Knutpara. Everyone else though began to feel remarkably calm. A quick kick to Angharad’s shin disabused him of his newfound peace, and John and Ella eventually followed suit, leaving the true Ob officers in an agreeable daze as Nicodemus invited the Watchmakers and MAP supporters to follow him out of the room while the Colossus advocates stayed behind. With nothing more than paranoia and vague unease to go on, we followed his directions, leaving Angharad to hobnob with wannabe tyrants. In the foyer, Lisandra, Ella and John found the second spanner: a giant, roiling mass of spirits comprising the Obscurati’s oft-mentioned but never-before-seen Ghost Council. A spectral monstrosity that Nicodemus very calmly proposed setting on the Colossus supporters in the theatre hall. A suggestion that nearly everyone present wholeheartedly agreed with. [I]Sodding Murderati.[/I] The only exceptions were the people that weren’t even supposed to be there: undercover Team BAD. Ella/Livia spoke up first, trying to make an eloquent case for the Obscurati not murdering half of their own people, while Lisandra frantically tried to think of a way to extricate Angharad from the potential slaughter. Seeing Ella’s pleas falling on death ears, the oracle - in her guise as ruthless murderer Oscan - stepped up to the plate and rebuked those present for advocating peace while proposing murder! Berating them for betraying the ideals of the MAP proposal so easily. With her final denouncement, she span toward the theatre hall doors and demanded to be let in. For if the Colossus advocates were going to die, then someone from the MAP proposal should stand by their bloody grand ideals and die with them! Her ploy to get to Angharad was foiled by the third spanner in our increasingly complicated evening, as Erskine stepped forward and spoke in a horribly familiar voice: “For those who do not know me, my name is Benedict Pemberton.” The dwarven duplicant’s chest opened, revealing a ticking bomb, as the dragon-in-dwarf’s-clothing stated that while he really hated the Ob, there were some present who he hated more: [I]Team BAD[/I]. And then he pointed at [B]us[/B]. Because of course he did. [I]Stupid Gradiax[/I]. Chaos ensued: Ob officers panicking, Ella trying to disable the bomb, Han Jierre vanishing, John being very confused about who to shoot, the Ghost Council floating toward the theatre hall full of blissfully unaware Colossus supporters, and Nicodemus watching it all with calm interest. Through the theatre hall doors, Angharad heard the muffled commotion and decided to take advantage of the calming effect in his room to coerce Catherine Romana into his Absurdist’s Web. An endeavour that was going fairly well until a scream from the foyer interrupted. For in Lisandra’s haste to get to the theatre doors, she’d stood in the way of the Ghost Council, and the ghosts had no qualms about sucking out her life force as they drifted by. The oracle didn’t back down though, enduring the energy drain as well as Nicodemus’ irritatingly calm comments with only terse replies. Their one-sided conversation was interrupted by a new voice: one coming from Nicodemus’ own mouth. A voice much more akin to that we’d heard upon first meeting Nicodemus’ current form: [I]Mr Mapple[/I]. The brief usurpation of his body by its true owner was enough to convince Nicodemus to leave, and with a snap of his fingers he vanished. Leaving us, a bomb, some fleeing Ob officers, and a room full of perturbed Colossus supporters. That perturbation soon turned to panic as the Ghost Council drifted through the theatre hall doors and began murdering people. Fortunately Angharad had finished ensnaring Catherine in his web and Dimension Door’d out of the room, leaving the Colossus members to their fate. Almost simultaneously, eight Ob officers in the foyer were going up in flames, courtesy of John’s Flame Strike. The flames were intense enough to turn them to ash, as John made good on our orders to capture or kill when the opportunity presented itself. Ella was… less than pleased though, as she suddenly found herself disabling a bomb for the benefit of nearly no one: with most of those who’d been present now dead or fled. Angharad turned to one of the few remaining Ob - the eladrin Cula - and said “Sorry about this” as he grappled her. The Srasama follower slapped him away with burning hands though and John proceeded to fill her with bullets, while a plucky Ob officer likewise shot at Lisandra. Drained of energy and now minus some flesh - but bonus a bullet! - Lisandra took one look at her attacker and sent him fleeing from the room with a spell. In the midst of the flames and gunshots and screams, Ella decided she wanted none of it. No more death. No more unnecessary suffering and hate. With a final, bitter comment, she teleported through the theatre hall’s doors and out of sight. Upon making it to those doors a few moments later, Lisandra found no sign of her friend, only an invisible barrier - as evidenced by Alloquacious the halfling slamming into it on his way out. The oracle didn’t have eyes for him though: instead searching for Ella amongst the chaos of fallen corpses, fleeing Colossus members, and writhing ghosts. She finally spotted her friend in the grasping arms of the Ghost Council: a tiny, ghostly tiefling who only gave her a brief look before stepping into the Council’s embrace. As she vanished, so did something in Lisandra. But there was no time to consider that. No space for grief. She gave Alloquacious some curt advice to seek a vent and left him to his fate, turning back to Angharad and John’s struggle with Cula. The eladrin had shot them both with lightning, slapped Angharad with fire hands, and stabbed the kineticist a few times, but John’s bullets were finally wearing her down, and it was with contempt that she spat: “I would sooner die to the beasts of this world than you fiends!” before teleporting away on 0 health. Probably condemning herself to a lonely death by blood loss… With the final combatant gone, the constables found themselves in a bubble of calm - not counting the screams from the Ghost Council’s hunt. When John and Angharad questioned Lisandra on Ella's whereabouts, the spirit medium simply replied: “Ella’s already left”. John immediately understood the morbid implication, but it took Angharad a moment longer. And when it clicked, it was only Lisandra’s reminder that dying here would prevent taking revenge later that kept the Mystic from flinging himself into the theatre. His scream of rage echoed alongside the panicked cries of the Obscurati as he turned away, abandoning the Colossus members to their fate: unwitting actors in a theatre of death, following the unknown script of their immortal leader. Yet the stage Team BAD find themselves upon now seems darker still: as they step from the lights of the palace into the shadows of the Bleak Gate. A place inhabited by monsters, filled with ghosts, and haunted by grief. Will they escape from this nightmare realm? Or find themselves joining its spectral denizens? Find out next time, on Zeitgeist. [B]GM Notes[/B] Ella died! The lede is buried in this recap, but she teleported into theatre hall to save Colossus members. The ghost council took no pleasure in destroying her. The party assumes the soul of Livia and Ella was sent to Nem, as per the spell used to implant their minds into their hosts. However, the council saw use in Ella, who was ideologically predisposed to the Ob's goals. When the many hands of the council dragged Ella's soul inwards, it was for safe keeping. As the possessor of Livia and a Pardwight graduate of law, she is uniquely equipped to challenge King Aodhan for the throne. She'll return in Adventure Nine, as leader of the ghost council. Admittedly, the ghost council was pumped up a bit. I gave it energy drain, knowing the party had several ways to outright protect themselves against negative energy and energy drain. However, Ella acted too hastily and was punished harshly for it. Out of character, the player admitted to knowing they could have prepared and survived, but that's not what she thought Ella would do in such a dire situation. Before this session, I also talked to this player about Ella's ideological alignment with the Ob. She thought the main reason Ella wouldn't join the Ob is because she trusts her friend's judgement over her own. I wouldn't normally bring a PC back as an evil character, but I think my players will enjoy it and I think it makes a huge amount of narrative sense. I'm looking forward to bringing her back and hearing (damn virtual games) my player's reactions... Also, RIP sexy Harry Potter and Gran Guiscard. The two Ob agents who shacked up at the convocation. They had one last embrace before being incinerated by the John's pillar of fire. [ATTACH type="full" alt="1657600274575.png"]253392[/ATTACH] [/QUOTE]
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