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[ZEITGEIST] The Continuing Adventures of Korrigan & Co.
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<blockquote data-quote="gideonpepys" data-source="post: 7389578" data-attributes="member: 79141"><p><strong>Diaspora - Reflections</strong></p><p></p><p>Phew! There we have it. Seven full months after we began Diaspora, we finally finished it. I’m usually quite a good judge of how many sessions an adventure will take, but in this case I was way out. Granted, we missed a couple of weeks at Christmas, spent two on a subplot, five on ‘optional extras’ (Bonds of Forced Faith & Vault of Heretics) and didn’t really turn our attention to Diaspora until the end of September, but it still feels like a real marathon in the best sense. As a DM I’m both exhausted and exhilarated and have taken a fortnight off to prep adventure #9 (more of which in a later post). I also thought we needed a break to mark the boundary between adventures.</p><p></p><p>One of the main reasons Diaspora ‘broke its banks’ in this way is because I took the campaign director’s advice very seriously and sought to avoid the adventure becoming ‘the Kasvarina show’. The main alteration I made – a long-term change planned several years ago – was to have the party pursue the memories of Uriel’s prior incarnations. These memories would provide incentives to visit other areas (and draw the group towards Pala in particular), as well as revealing Stanfield as a big bad because that was a huge part of the character’s story and it flowed more organically from him. I also took pains to weave Rumdoom’s eschatology cult into the adventure, with a minor side-quest to retrieve the Skull of Cheshimox from Trekhom (in case the party missed the hints to go there) and a major side-quest to access memories that had been secreted by the Ob Triad within the Stone of Not. This transformed the Stone from a player-generated McGuffin to an element of the main story, and allowed me to set up a major rivalry with Grandis Kamanov, who now has the Stone. There were also key revelations for Gupta who learned that her family were secretly Vekeshi Mystics and had played a part in their own demise (by inadvertently helping to build the colossus), and worse, that their souls are now trapped inside Borne. (Oh, and her transformation into a weretiger, too!) And last but not least was the gradual development of a romance between Leon and Kasvarina – an offer I made the player through the use of ‘GM Intrusions’, a lovely Cypher System mechanic that in this case took the form of becoming tongue-tied and feeling bound to pursue Kasvarina’s affections. I didn’t pre-determine the outcome here, but the player accepted the challenge and worked to develop the storyline consistently (by the end of which it was revealed that he was once trained by Kasvarina and regarded himself to have been betwitched by her).</p><p></p><p>There were even more added elements that cropped up as we went along. Off the top of my head, in no particular order there was:</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The return of Gale, who needed to come back into our story at this point as we haven't seen her for <em>years</em>.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The relentless attacks of Han Jierre, culminating in the destruction of the Impossible. (So Han becomes a more central foe.)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Inclusion of almost all party allies from earlier in the campaign – Oolsholeel, Sly Marbo, Bernard of Glenwade, Krazy Krauss, and numerous members of Team B.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Working Sokana Rel back into the campaign in a major way. (And Lt. Marseine, of which I am particularly proud – I knew that guy had a portrait for a reason!)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">My version of the <em>El Primo</em> subplot, which generated a lot of amusement at the table.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Several trips to Macdam – including a major confrontation with the Ob and a vital parley with Benedict Pemberton.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A jaunt to the Perpetual City.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Another quick jaunt to the ‘Crucible’ to resurrect Gupta’s lover, Helandra.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Matunaaga’s farewell episode. (<em>Sniff!</em>)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The introduction of Quratulain.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The opportunity to reconnect with Flint thanks to multiple extended visits. (Very important for our group as we haven’t been there much since the reboot.)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The opportunity to remind the group as they travelled of key narrative hooks.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Kieran Sentacore and Bhalu became major allies of the party, and fully fleshed-out NPCs.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The expansion of Korrigan’s web of international contacts, and the relaunch of his political ambitions.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The opportunity to explore new aspects to their powers (thanks to XP overload).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Something I’d been hoping the party would do for a while: a needlewire parley with Nicodemus.</li> </ul><p>On top of all that, there is also the inescapable fact that Diaspora is something of a readaloudathon, which in other adventures (and perhaps with other groups) might be a problem. The Lance of Triegenes is the most egregious example of this: After multiple memory events on the Ascent of Screaming Souls, there are two key, major events at the top which take about ten minutes to describe. I gave my group a heads up about this and they nodded firmly to express their commitment to the story: after months of travelling with Kasvarina they were happy to discover how her story turned out. </p><p></p><p>The gradual, steady sprawl of the adventure had the welcome consequence of truly embedding Kasvarina with the group. To be honest, I couldn’t be sure how the group would respond to Kasvarina as I wasn’t sure how I felt about her myself. Part of me didn’t like her and didn’t want her to be rehabilitated and redeemed. I kind of liked the idea that the party might explore the world with her and help her restore her memories, only for her to revert to form and rejoin the conspiracy. But I didn’t want to bias the outcome from the start by playing Kasvarina in a specific way – too sympathetically, or too unsympathetically (subconsciously or otherwise) – so I decided not to roleplay her in any way, and simply narrate or describe her actions. Travelling with Kasvarina for such a long time had the effect of warming me to her, and hopefully it had the same effect on my players. They involved her more than any other DMNPC in decision making, and seemed to be very much on her side by the end of things. Moving forward, Kasvarina is going to have a bigger role in my campaign than she does in the published AP. I understand that she couldn’t really be worked into the subsequent adventures in a major way as the writers could not predict would had happened to her, which leaves a lovely blank slate for me to start with. I’m pretty pleased with my idea, but will resist the temptation to spill the beans here, save to say that it is predicated on the idea that Kasvarina now has a link to the plane of time, thanks to her long-term use of the Arc and its interaction with the Dead Magic Zone, and is going to help me tie up a lot of loose ends!</p><p></p><p>PS: Lost in all this is the fabulous section of the adventure when the PCs pursue the Arc, and in our case sought to avert tragedy at all costs. I loved that part of the adventure, and had all but forgotten about it. What an embarrassment of riches! Thank you to everyone involved in the creation of this fabulous adventure, and this wonderful campaign.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="gideonpepys, post: 7389578, member: 79141"] [b]Diaspora - Reflections[/b] Phew! There we have it. Seven full months after we began Diaspora, we finally finished it. I’m usually quite a good judge of how many sessions an adventure will take, but in this case I was way out. Granted, we missed a couple of weeks at Christmas, spent two on a subplot, five on ‘optional extras’ (Bonds of Forced Faith & Vault of Heretics) and didn’t really turn our attention to Diaspora until the end of September, but it still feels like a real marathon in the best sense. As a DM I’m both exhausted and exhilarated and have taken a fortnight off to prep adventure #9 (more of which in a later post). I also thought we needed a break to mark the boundary between adventures. One of the main reasons Diaspora ‘broke its banks’ in this way is because I took the campaign director’s advice very seriously and sought to avoid the adventure becoming ‘the Kasvarina show’. The main alteration I made – a long-term change planned several years ago – was to have the party pursue the memories of Uriel’s prior incarnations. These memories would provide incentives to visit other areas (and draw the group towards Pala in particular), as well as revealing Stanfield as a big bad because that was a huge part of the character’s story and it flowed more organically from him. I also took pains to weave Rumdoom’s eschatology cult into the adventure, with a minor side-quest to retrieve the Skull of Cheshimox from Trekhom (in case the party missed the hints to go there) and a major side-quest to access memories that had been secreted by the Ob Triad within the Stone of Not. This transformed the Stone from a player-generated McGuffin to an element of the main story, and allowed me to set up a major rivalry with Grandis Kamanov, who now has the Stone. There were also key revelations for Gupta who learned that her family were secretly Vekeshi Mystics and had played a part in their own demise (by inadvertently helping to build the colossus), and worse, that their souls are now trapped inside Borne. (Oh, and her transformation into a weretiger, too!) And last but not least was the gradual development of a romance between Leon and Kasvarina – an offer I made the player through the use of ‘GM Intrusions’, a lovely Cypher System mechanic that in this case took the form of becoming tongue-tied and feeling bound to pursue Kasvarina’s affections. I didn’t pre-determine the outcome here, but the player accepted the challenge and worked to develop the storyline consistently (by the end of which it was revealed that he was once trained by Kasvarina and regarded himself to have been betwitched by her). There were even more added elements that cropped up as we went along. Off the top of my head, in no particular order there was: [LIST] [*]The return of Gale, who needed to come back into our story at this point as we haven't seen her for [I]years[/I]. [*]The relentless attacks of Han Jierre, culminating in the destruction of the Impossible. (So Han becomes a more central foe.) [*]Inclusion of almost all party allies from earlier in the campaign – Oolsholeel, Sly Marbo, Bernard of Glenwade, Krazy Krauss, and numerous members of Team B. [*]Working Sokana Rel back into the campaign in a major way. (And Lt. Marseine, of which I am particularly proud – I knew that guy had a portrait for a reason!) [*]My version of the [I]El Primo[/I] subplot, which generated a lot of amusement at the table. [*]Several trips to Macdam – including a major confrontation with the Ob and a vital parley with Benedict Pemberton. [*]A jaunt to the Perpetual City. [*]Another quick jaunt to the ‘Crucible’ to resurrect Gupta’s lover, Helandra. [*]Matunaaga’s farewell episode. ([I]Sniff![/I]) [*]The introduction of Quratulain. [*]The opportunity to reconnect with Flint thanks to multiple extended visits. (Very important for our group as we haven’t been there much since the reboot.) [*]The opportunity to remind the group as they travelled of key narrative hooks. [*]Kieran Sentacore and Bhalu became major allies of the party, and fully fleshed-out NPCs. [*]The expansion of Korrigan’s web of international contacts, and the relaunch of his political ambitions. [*]The opportunity to explore new aspects to their powers (thanks to XP overload). [*]Something I’d been hoping the party would do for a while: a needlewire parley with Nicodemus. [/LIST] On top of all that, there is also the inescapable fact that Diaspora is something of a readaloudathon, which in other adventures (and perhaps with other groups) might be a problem. The Lance of Triegenes is the most egregious example of this: After multiple memory events on the Ascent of Screaming Souls, there are two key, major events at the top which take about ten minutes to describe. I gave my group a heads up about this and they nodded firmly to express their commitment to the story: after months of travelling with Kasvarina they were happy to discover how her story turned out. The gradual, steady sprawl of the adventure had the welcome consequence of truly embedding Kasvarina with the group. To be honest, I couldn’t be sure how the group would respond to Kasvarina as I wasn’t sure how I felt about her myself. Part of me didn’t like her and didn’t want her to be rehabilitated and redeemed. I kind of liked the idea that the party might explore the world with her and help her restore her memories, only for her to revert to form and rejoin the conspiracy. But I didn’t want to bias the outcome from the start by playing Kasvarina in a specific way – too sympathetically, or too unsympathetically (subconsciously or otherwise) – so I decided not to roleplay her in any way, and simply narrate or describe her actions. Travelling with Kasvarina for such a long time had the effect of warming me to her, and hopefully it had the same effect on my players. They involved her more than any other DMNPC in decision making, and seemed to be very much on her side by the end of things. Moving forward, Kasvarina is going to have a bigger role in my campaign than she does in the published AP. I understand that she couldn’t really be worked into the subsequent adventures in a major way as the writers could not predict would had happened to her, which leaves a lovely blank slate for me to start with. I’m pretty pleased with my idea, but will resist the temptation to spill the beans here, save to say that it is predicated on the idea that Kasvarina now has a link to the plane of time, thanks to her long-term use of the Arc and its interaction with the Dead Magic Zone, and is going to help me tie up a lot of loose ends! PS: Lost in all this is the fabulous section of the adventure when the PCs pursue the Arc, and in our case sought to avert tragedy at all costs. I loved that part of the adventure, and had all but forgotten about it. What an embarrassment of riches! Thank you to everyone involved in the creation of this fabulous adventure, and this wonderful campaign. [/QUOTE]
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