BE: Fires Over Omac and World Burning

[IMAGinES]

Folks, I'm afriad I have some sad news. The Frustrated Wannabe Burning Empires GMs Club, membership: one, was closed down today, due to the sudden ineligibility of its founding and sole member.

Yep, I finally got some fucking game!

So Tracey, Patrick and Scott responded to my e-mails to let me know they could make it, and about half an hour before everyone wqas due to arrive I got another e-mail from Brett saying he could come along. So all four PCs were taken!

The good news is that fun was indeed had. The semi-good news is that the session wasn't quite burned; it was more on the medium-rare side. There was a bit too much table-chatter; options were being bounced back and forth and over-discussed while I sat at my end of the table, thinking "I know I need to crank up the pace and apply some pressure here and I have at least two building scenes and a conflict I can do it with - but what the hell am I going to do with them?" For some odd reason the list of builders and conflicts wasn't much help; I found myself unable to translate them into actual actions (at least, enough to take up three build tests). During the conflict, when the players broke into the prison to steal the Warden's secret stash of coltane, I was thinking, "D'oh! Guards! Guns! Security systems! Probably some Vaylen too!" As it was, though, we weren't able to finish the conflict by the time Brett had to leave, and as it was a squad of iron and a squad of Kerrn vs. two squads of generic rent-a-cops at skill 3 I gave in to the players.

Note to self: I'm still a tad underconfident with using Circles tests to generate squads of mooks. Should I be rolling/asking for rolls of something else?

Frankly, I think my "Brain- not- working!" problems were all due to a mild case of panic; that was the first "serious" game I've had since - well, since Reefcon, which was mid-last year (and mostly D&D). Plus there was all that getting used to actually playing the rules. Tracey, Scott and Patrick reckoned things did take a bit of time to start moving, but they were fairly cooking along by the end.

Nonetheless, it was definitely a positive learning experience. On top of that, all my players were very willing to give World Burning a go, although Brett had to leave just as we closed Fires Over Omac off. We got as far as establishing the Figures of Note before I had to kick them out - it was dinner time, and other members of the family had turned up for roast pork. We're planning to get together on the Esplanade in Cairns to do Character Burning proper, and as soon as I can remember what the name of our planet was I'll post it on the Wiki. (I'll have to drum up a campaign name too.) In the meantime I hope I can get some of them in here to post about their experiences.

But, yeah - I GOT GAME, baby! Boy is it a relief!

[luke]

Good to hear, man. I'm sure you did fine (and now you know what else to do for next time).

-L

[IMAGinES]

Thanks, Luke. I do indeed have a better idea of how it all works - although I think I'll re-read the Firefight chapter!

I've temporarily placed our World Burning details thus far here. Once I get the planet's name from my players (we did come up with one and wrote it down, but Scott took the notes with him and now I can't remember) and come up with a campaign name I'll transfer it to the Burning Empires Wiki. I've also put some additional thoughts about what I learned from the session here.

Quick couple of questions:

1. The book says each player has the option of introducing a faction. That includes me as GM, right? If so, I think I missed myself...

2. If you successfully Take Action to destroy a faction, you get the current phase's dispo bonus, but neither you nor your opponent can Take Action to control the faction in later phases, right?

[Iskander]

First one's easy: yes, you get to pick a faction, too - if you want.

[luke]

2. Destroyed factions can't be activated (or destroyed) for further dispo bonus in the current phase. Also, raise Circles and Resources obstacles for dealing with those factions accordingly. (More on that soon.) "Destroyed" factions are reset in the epilogues. Transform them in to a new iteration of themselves -- a rebel underground, a new company, a new political party -- and reintroduce them.

[IMAGinES]

First one's easy: yes, you get to pick a faction, too - if you want.

Groovy. Thinking about it. More on that in a sec.

2. Destroyed factions can't be activated (or destroyed) for further dispo bonus in the current phase. Also, raise Circles and Resources obstacles for dealing with those factions accordingly. (More on that soon.) "Destroyed" factions are reset in the epilogues. Transform them in to a new iteration of themselves -- a rebel underground, a new company, a new political party -- and reintroduce them.

Ah, I see what you mean - although a faction might be destroyed, some of the people who were part of it will still be around. Thank you, Luke!

[mtiru]

hey rob-

your world seems to be coming together well - you'll need to find a way to best incorporate the player who missed the world burning. here's a piece of advice for the factions bit.

in our the world we just played (Domu-Koppel) with four + GM, we only had three factions chosen. this was to both speed up the game, and really focus on the conflicts that we as players were interested in having.

i found it was much more focused, and thus more interesting than some of our other campaigns where everyone contributed a faction.

[IMAGinES]

hey rob-

your world seems to be coming together well - you'll need to find a way to best incorporate the player who missed the world burning. here's a piece of advice for the factions bit.

in our the world we just played (Domu-Koppel) with four + GM, we only had three factions chosen. this was to both speed up the game, and really focus on the conflicts that we as players were interested in having.

i found it was much more focused, and thus more interesting than some of our other campaigns where everyone contributed a faction.

Mayuran, I'm glad you liked the way the world is looking as is. Lemme tell you why:

It happens every fucking campaign I run. Just ask my wife, she knows all about it. It kinda happned with that Heavy Gear game I ran four years ago, it happened in a huge way with a Primetime Adventures game that only got as far as the Pitch Session last year and it's setting in again here. We get through setting and/or character creation and I start to get antsy. I pick holes in the world and character design. It's Not Grabby Enough. Any seeming inconsistency Must Be Fixed ASAP or else The Game Will Fall Apart.

It's the paranoid control freak in me coming out, and the sane part of me says I just need to let it go and trust that I and my players will be able to bring drama aplenty. But - well, let me showed you what I e-mailed my players last night, it'll make more sense:

(The Character Burner text on the Comoran Worlds) brings up some interesting questions regarding how we burned our world. I remember when we started off, the Comoran Worlds appealed to you folks because of the civil war happening within it, and per the attached text you can see that it's a battle between two religions. We seemed to forget about it by the time we got around to the societal parts of World Burning, we pretty much ignored that part of it entirely. Our factons either want to oust the Stewardship or have Figures of Note who wnat to oust the Stewardship, but none of them are at each other's throats; what's more, neither the Theocracy nor the Cult Churches factions are present.

Given that we've chosen the Comoran Worlds, do we want to revise the world somewhat? My first thought is to axe the Stewardship entirely and elevate the Merchant League to the dominant government (as our main concept was a trading planet), then bring in either the Theocracy or Cult Churches faction.

It'll mean we'll have to rethink our Figures of Note somewhat, but we can go over that on Wednesday.

If I knew what was good for me and left the world pretty much as is, the only thing I'd do would be introduce the Nobility faction; it'll give that whole "Will The Lord Constable Marry The Lord Steward?" angle a little more bite, not to mention open up the Nobility lifepath for the Lord Constable.

[IMAGinES]

Actually, I had an interesting development last night. Tracey, who took the Lord Constable, isn't exactly comfortable with the idea of playing that character. She thought that Fires Over Omac was more political than she was expecting (! Note to self: Keep the pressure on, moron!) and wants to do something a little more adventure-ish.

In response, I sent out an e-mail to everyone re-assuring them they didn't all have to take Figures of Note. Still, we do have an arse-kicking Lord Constable who's in charge of the local Imperial forces - maybe all we need to do is start with Usurpation and create a situation of internal strife, so she can kick some doors down and take some names. (Can you get away with slathering the action on in the Infection phase?)