GM: Sean Nittner
Players: Karen Twelves, Adrienne Mueller, Eric Fattig
System: Spell and Blade by Stras Acimovic
Our game was simultaneously epic and adversarial. Epic because they ended a curse, defeated Stone Breaker, the Beast to Storms, recovered the fragment of a legendary artifact, and saved the Temple of Kahainu from destruction. Adversarial because I felt like I kept saying “no” to the players, or more specifically I’d kept saying “not without doing…” and the conditions I offered were never enticing, they just felt like work or punishment.
Thought the game I felt torn between presenting a fictional world with it’s own internal consistency and advocating for the heroes, and I felt like I failed at both. Here’s a few area where I struggled:
Resistance Rolls
The first roll of the game, to decipher mystic text painted on the walls of the temple sanctum, got a 4/5 result. Before I described the outcome Adrienne said she would resist the consequence, which felt like a failure on my part to breathe life into the world. If the fiction is so hollow that complications are just speed bumps towards progress, then I’ve presented a boring place to interact with. Or, worse, I’ve developed a reputation for offering such terrible consequences that they should always be resisted. Maybe both.
I decided the consequence was that it took a few hours to decipher, during that time more rubble fell as Stonebreaker attacked the temple outside. That wasn’t so bad and Thorgi decided not to resist it, but I kept doubting myself. Did I intentionally offer up a mild consequence because I wanted to show you don’t always need to resist them? Or was I reflecting the situation at hand?
I think it didn’t help that before the roll I said another character can’t offer aid (a boost) on a Recall roll. I didn’t go into all of the reasons why but each skill in Spell & Blades is actually it’s own mini-game. Having the Craft skill, for instance means you can craft the thing your trained in (cooking, smithing, singing, etc). You can learn to craft separate things, but having a dot in the skill doesn’t automatically grant you a skill die in all Craft rolls. If you want to both be a musician and a smith, you have to train form them and sometimes gain traits accordingly (like Musician or Master Smith). Recall is similar. The reason you can’t boost a Recall roll is one part the fiction (people all have different backgrounds and training and one person’s knowledge isn’t the same as the other) and one part to enable a suite of traits like Lore and Educated, which offer gear and boosts to Recall rolls they apply to. It is by design that some action rolls are harder to build dice pools for than others based on how rare the knowledge is in the world. Someone is trying to push a rock up a hill and you pitch in to shove, you can absolutely offer help, just spend a point of vigor and describe putting your back into it. But if someone is trying to transform themselves from a person into a Wizard undergoing apotheosis, only incredible training and preparations will aid them. All action rolls fall somewhere in that continuum.
I had also said that putting Blue Water on her eyes would not help decipher the script, because although it was a cool visual, this wasn’t a matter of of the script magically revealing it’s meaning, it required the hard work of deciphering it symbol by symbol. Books, however, did add a gear die, and the Educated trait offered a boost. Was this fidelity to the world or just shutting a player down and saying their ideas weren’t as good as my ideas?
More thoughts on Resistance rolls. A tangent not germane to this specific session. I love the Resistance mechanic because it allows GMs to present horrible threats and a player can describe a way their character, against all odds or with great effort, survives or evades them. In practice though, Resistance rolls are often used by the player to trade expending resources in place of accepting consequences, rather than reflecting their character’s efforts. The sense of hard earned victory or narrowly avoiding peril is gone is reduced to check boxes on the character sheet.
When a consequence happens, I want to look at the current situation and ask how someone is going to resist. What effort will they undergo, and, is it always possible? Sometimes the character’s don’t have the means to stop something from happening, and I really struggle to justify how it would be avoided. In the few times in Blades games that I’ve said something couldn’t be resisted, the player reaction has always one of betrayal, that I was breaking the rules. Instead of conveying that the situation was dire, I think I was just taking away player agency. It has always been a shitty feeling for everyone.
Interrogating the Fiction
From sharing songs with the drill-horn whale guardians, they learned that the curse could be exorcised into another creature that is alive (or was once alive). Something like the blue starfish was too small, but another person would work. They decided to do something larger…much larger. They would exorcise the curse into the great hammerhead shark itself! I loved this plan, but I don’t think I showed that enough. I was wondering how they would do it and I posed his two Legendary Questions:
- How do you harm something that ignores the blows from mortal weapons?
- How do you survive its bone crushing rams and armor-rending jaws?
Since the creature had been slain and stitched back together again, Zaya reckoned that it was undead, or sort of undead, or at least a little bit dead. If so, her Blacksilver blade should be able to cut it.
The party had already made allies with the Guardians, through their songs and actions. So they planned to throw Loka’s net over the drill horn and let the Guardians pull them so the could get away fast enough.
Neither of these were sure things (I was going to call for action rolls) but they were possible, so the actions would not automatically fail. Huzzah!
Evading the shark was great. The pod of guardians were pulling the heroes along but the shark moved too fast and would catch them. Two of the guardians would sacrifice themselves to slow him down, dying in the process, but Thorgi had the tulwah pods she knew would make him drowsy, and so she wrapped them up in her bloody bandages [gear die] and tossed them into his gaping jaw. When he chomped down, she narrowly avoided him biting off her leg, but he took one of her fancy boots with him. A very close call.
When the got close to the beath the heroes inciting him to charge so fast that he beached himself. Again, I think the action roll went just as we would have hoped. Zaya used Whisper to communicate with animals, which she could uniquely do because she was slowly transforming into a shark. I let her “grow the curse” as a boost, becoming more sharklike herself, to goad her brethren on. It worked and Stone Breaker charged up onto the beach and into the edge of the jungle where his hammer head uprooted trees as he flailed about, trying to get back into the water.
Then we got to the third action roll, where Loka wanted to cut open Stonebreaker so Thorgi (now marked by Kahainu) and the Guardians could pray for a miracle to exorcise the curse from Zaya, into the great beast. I paused before offering a gear die. Yes, the Blacksilver blade was potent against undead, but it was just too short to do any real harm to it. It’s skin was too thick. So I asked how Loka would do harm with the blade. Karen described jumping up where he had been stitched back together and the wound had not full healed. That made a lot of sense, especially because undead or not, that part of him was definitely necrotic flesh. I offered the gear die, and it worked out, but the whole conversation felt adversarial, like I was trying to find reasons to deny the gear die to her. I wanted to really understand how it was working, but she had already explained the plan and I should have just accepted it. Better yet, I should have described how the Blacksiler blade, which felt heavy in her hands, as it carried the weight of Zaya’s ancestors, seared through the necrotic flesh. I should have been cheering her along and instead I was casting doubt. It’s important to me that I present the world as real. It’s important that I cheer on the players. I felt torn between the two.
Leads on Adventures
Throughout the session (and in previous sessions), I was offering leads on things that could be future adventures. The husk of a giant crab on an island where Dragon Prawn could be found, crafting the shard of a legendary blade into a legendary weapon of your own, bringing a fleet of Tkat ships to slay Stonebreaker. In the previous sessions I mentioned the missing ship (the Aurora) and Zaya knowing where the magical storms were coming from.
But I did it wrong every time. Either I said it too flippantly “Oh yeah, on our way here, we saw a small island with the husk of a giant blue crab” and it seemed like it was a trivial task, or presented it like an impossible quest “You could travel to the frozen north of Iskanard where they craft star metal and they could make you a legendary weapon” when Loka just wanted to wrap some leather around the blade so it could be safely handled and used as a weapon. Each time it felt like a gotcha.
The biggest gotcha of them all was presenting Stone Breaker as a threat without a means of killing him. It’s not that he’s unkillable, it’s just that the last time it was done, a god or a titan or something with a 30′ long legendary blade, did it. So, to do it again, some equally incredible means will have to be used. I felt like this would be a great adventure itself. Or maybe even a string of adventures. First to find a way to destroy it and then to seek it out and do the deed.
What I thought was an offer for a future adventure, was a denial in the moment. Loka had pulled a tiny fragment of the legendary blade that slew Stone Breaker the first time out of the would she made, and so it seemed like she had a weapon. And I liked the idea, but in the moment using it would be like trying to kill someone with a splinter. The blade was dangerous to it, but it was only a few inches long and they had no way of holding or using it effectively without a hilt.
One ideas was suggested was being swallowed whole by the creature and using the blade to cut it open from the inside. That also felt doable if the blade could be crafted into something that could be used. Every offer I had at the moment was disappointing because they were all predicated on leaving this terror alive, where he could keep attacking the temple.
We did find a middle ground. Stone Braker, from the eye on the side of his head, could see Loka hanging onto his side, and the glint from the legendary blade in her hand. Holding aloft the a fragment of the blade that once slew him, Loka filled this terrible beast with fear. The exorcism was complete and the curse has been transferred into it (making the legendary shark, even more sharklike). In heaved itself back and crashed into the waters behind it. Loka freed herself from the rope she had used to hold onto it and swam away as it fled deep into the sea!
Super cool stuff, but it seemed like it was always at my discretion. That I shut down other ideas. And that it wasn’t a conversation about what made sense in the world, but whether it was an idea that I liked. I know people who only get excited about their own ideas. I don’t want to be that person.
Upkeep Costs
We moved to the town phase and I didn’t have a good answer for why someone of Social Tier 3 has to pay more to stay than someone of Social Tier 1. I could say it is a lifestyle you are accustomed to, but not why it wasn’t a choice to stay at a cheaper place. In the real world, I buy the cheapest seat on the flight I can, even when I could theoretically pay for a nicer one. Why can’t characters do the same? I didn’t have a good answer for that.
Other little things
I think some of the careers needs their town actions updated. For instance, the resupply action doesn’t cost coin, so Black Market Connections can’t make it cheaper. Also resupply is specifically for common items and Black Market Connections says the smuggler is good a getting hard to find items, which is kind of the opposite.
It felt strange that the only follower of Kahainu didn’t get marked and the two characters from other nations (Lykard and Verard) did. The marking was a result of taking a physical would when swimming through the coral (the cuts formed the patterns of Kahainu’s mark) and the blood was a major hazard (it drew Stone Breaker’s attention) but it was also a cool thing and the one person most connected to the god in her own beliefs and cultures, didn’t get it. It felt like Loka was being punished for avoiding a hazard. It wasn’t so unfair when the realized that being Marked means the god expects things of you as well and may send you strange dreams, but still felt off.
Some amazing moments
I captured a lot of them already (even when I was struggling with the rules, the heroes were doing awesome stuff), but here a few things not mentioned above that were very cool.
Swimming through the blue water into a dark tunnel, emerging and getting the aid of the guardians to get to the surface and gasp for air.
Zaya using the rope from the harpoon to climb up onto Stonebreaker. Then vomiting forth the horrible curse so powerfully it broke her sternum.
Loka trying to pull the shard of the legendary blade out with tongs and when she couldn’t get a grip, going in with her hand and getting cut horribly, but pulling free the legendary shard.
Thorgi learning the songs of the whales and singing to them from the sanctum to gain their aid. Because each song was a story, it was very
The camp scenes were all filled with discussion of love lives and we learned some wonderful things about the characters. We learned that Zaya wasn’t really interested in romance any more. She had been in the past, but now that she was preparing to become a Wizard, men were just a distraction. And that all the of the traits Thorgi saw in Corum the Carefull were not things she wanted any more…but maybe Thorgi did? When the attention was turned on her Thorgi got very awkward “But Zaya, you’re so beautiful.” Loka reassured her “Thorgi, do you think you’re not lovable? I love you. You’re a dear friend.”
Zaya and Loka encouraged Thorgi over and over and eventually (we had a couple of camp scenes) the confided in them that once upon a time she asked a boy to a dance and he laughed at her. She even had a beautiful dress made for the occasion and she felt terrible. Loka wanted to know his name so she could hunt him down and make him pay for hurting her friend. It was very sweet.
Deeds
Deeds of might, and cunning, and honor were granted for exorcising the curse, cutting open the shark and pulling out the sword fragment, protecting the Guardians, and learning their songs.
Town Phase
The oathbound adventurers were picked up by the Candlelight and brought to a flotilla filled with many Mkeshi boats. The could see different styles of dress, jewelry, and art, along with many families and people from other fleets. From the crew on the Candlelight they learned that Sodrin (who Thorgi had a crush on) had left the ship on a small boat of his own. They failed to find the Aurora but he wouldn’t turn back, so he went out on his own. Also, Yaka Lanaforge was looking for someone to help her recover bezite crystals to make a ground flow regulator (she’d had more glitches of late) and was paying handsomely for adventurers to go find them for her.
When they arrived in town, Zaya had recovered some Blue Water from the temple, which Loka helped her to sell, explaining the reverence the Tkat have for such a thing, and that it was a holy item among her people.
They stayed in the flotilla for two weeks (two town phases) and during that time:
- Zaya convalesced twice (she had a critical hit), caroused to find a teacher (Yaka Lanaforge) to teach her the Resolute trait, and trained with her.
- Thorgi convalesced (she had some wounds), and held two cookouts (one where she cooked with the tulwuh pods, and one where she cooked with Tkat ingredients she hadn’t see before) advancing her knowledge of the Home Cooking trait. She also resupplied her gear.
- Loka convalesced (she had a wound), caroused to find a trainer (Captain Nor’Fari), trained with her to work on the Quick trait, and restocked her supplies.
The healer, Ush’Ariz, who tended to them, heard of their deeds, how they protected a temple of Kahainu, and would not take their coin for his ministrations. [This was both appropriate for the fiction, and I felt like the adventure didn’t have enough loot in it, so it seemed like a good way to make up for some of the coin they would have earned].
Final thoughts and questions
How to clear debt to a god if you’re not a chosen? Perform services for them. But usually you pledge that service when you pray for their miracles. So next time, I’ll go back and ask what they would have offered to do. Maybe it can be paid off in town or time passes, or maybe it will be another adventure. Or maybe bit by bit, over time. Or maybe it will be ignored and their dreams will get…more interesting.
Next session we’ll do time passes.
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Adventure notes
Improvements for the adventure:
- Show that the Guardians are keeping Stone Breaker at bay (in this game, I presented the temple as being in immediate peril.
- Add Silver chains to the bottom of the sea floor.
- Make Stone Breaker’s ropes rotting, show how he’s falling apart. Make him vulnerable.
- Give Aya a black silver blade and a bone ward (rattles when the island shakes). She senses the undead and can tell the players about it.
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