GM: Sam Tillis
Players: Adrienne Mueller, Dylan Arena, James Lawton, Sean Nittner, Sarah Terman, Matthew Fisher
System: Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition
Content warning: body horror bits masked (like this)
Shanghai sprawls, a web of 1½ million souls strung to a tributary like a frayed thread of the great Yangtze River, just before it disgorges its algaec waters into the East China Sea. Its strands are streets choked with skulkers & riders—rickshaws and bicycles, electric streetcars and automobiles. These streets know violence: the snap of a firearm, the crack of a bludgeon are not uncommon in this realm of flies and spiders, this great game of subtle moves & crushing blows. And so it is as a Japanese man stares down a Type 14 Nambu semiautomatic pistol at Colby Slater, even as Charles Morisley watches from afar.
The man in foreman’s clothes was no longer pretending to be drunk. He lowered his gun and asked Colby “Are you looking for a man?” When Colby confirmed he said “I to am looking for a man. As are they.” Referring to the dead man at his feet and the two that ran off.
Colby offered the name “Jack Brady” and the man, who introduced himself as Isoge, confirmed that everyone involved in this recent altercation were also looking for Brady. He asked Colby why he wanted to find the man.
“We think he can help us stop a calamity.”
Isoge retorted “He might have caused a calamity.”
“We know. He’s not our friend, he’s our quarry.”
As Charles entered the scene he spotted two attractive women smoking cigarettes at the base on the alley that Colby and Isoge were talking in. The women seemed unperturbed by the recent violence they witnessed and Charles got the sense that they were another set of eyes for yet another unknown faction.
Charles introduced himself in his normal forthright manner, but when he mentioned the women Isoge stiffened and became even more alert. Though they were in an alley with only one visible exit (back where the women were watching) he determined they would find another way “We are going to leave this alleyway through that door. I do not know what is on the other side of that door, but we’re going that way regardless.”
Eventually, moving through many shop back rooms and twisting turns the three men made it back outside, far away from their waters. Isoge finally offered that “I am with people that have a keen interest in what happens to China.”
“We are interested in reducing the bloodshed of innocents.” Colby thought the statement was a pretty universal one but Isoge gave him a flat look, neither aligning or separating himself from our cause.
The did agree that they both wanted information from Brady, and that it seemed as though they may not have identical desires, neither were they conflicting.
Isoge offered “We should work together. I’ll continue my presence at the Stumbling Tiger Bar. It would appear strange if I didn’t. If you find him, please let me know first.”
Colby asked if Fergus Chun worked for Ho Fang and got another noncommittal look.
“He is not a follower, but he may still have dealings with him. To borrow a sports metaphor, many believe that in the search for Jack Brady the Stumbling Tiger Bar is the “first base”. I might know the second, but I cannot share that with you…yet. I do not know what paths lead to Brady, and which lead to death and dishonor.” Isoge did give us two addresses though, that of Ho Fang’s warehouse and his personal estate. “Jack Brady is here. He and his allies mean violence.”
When we asked if Isoge could help us find him or combat Ho Fang, he offered that he could draw their attention if that would be helpful. Yes, very helpful indeed!
As Colby studied him [Extreme success on a psychology roll] it was clear that this man has many depths, but he did not appear a cultist, more like someone in the military with secrets to keep. He may be concealing things, but he was not lying.
“Go well and safely, Charles and Colby.”
Investigations wrapping up for the day
At the Shanghai Courier Iris and Amos wrapped for the day. They’d have to come back tomorrow to find more.
Catherine and Francois made it back to the hotel from the Stumbling Tiger Bar, apparently unfollowed.
Colby (miraculously unscathed) and Charles returned soon after.
Factions
The investigators reconvened to discuss who the major players were in this cat and mouse game. Thanks to Li-Wen (who was the only one that joined the investigators in the topics of darker subjects) we learned of one more:
- Ho Fang. The business and the man. Possibly a sorcerer.
- Isoge’s faction – Japanese military?
- Brady and his allies
- Fergus, maybe on his own, maybe with some backing
- Other who are watching
- The Green Gang, who run the police (we learned about from Li-Wen)
Catherine believed that despite destroying our note, Fergus still intended to deliver the message to Brady. She thought he likely destroyed it so it couldn’t get into anyone else’s hands. Her faint in the man rested entirely on the good impression she got of him. Hopefully she was not being too gullible.
Li-Wen also told us about an uncle she has in Shanghai who was very “out there”. He’s an astrologer. A non-serious person who goes by Mr. Lung. If we meet we should take him in with ironic detachment.
Late Night Endeavors
Jimmy pulled Francois aside to ask how he was holding up and more importantly “Are we really okay with Nails Nelson? He seems unhinged.”
Francois couldn’t disagree but did have some sympathy for the man “He’s seen a lot. He’s had to cope with violence and has done so by becoming part of it.”
“But he drinks…a lot!” There was much agreement that he drank to much, but neither could think of much to do about it.
Jimmy also commented on our newest companion “You know Li-Wen listens at doors when you’re all meeting right?” Here habits also seemed outside the realm of our ability address.
Meanwhile Catherine was pulling Li-Wen aside “You seem like a person who takes shortcuts to get what you want. Francois can offer you shortcuts.”
Li-Wen was interested.
“You must appeal to his desire to keep the world safe and make it a better place.”
Li-Wen would try.
Amos and Iris met in dreaming, but not without some difficulty. Amos arrived as he was accustomed to, but Iris was insulated by a white, fuzzy gauze that kept her dreaming instead of Dreaming. Amos noticed her absence and cast Send Dream to send her a portal into Dreaming. He succeeded, but he also felt there was a viscous barrier around her. He showed her a door that lead to Dreaming.
“Was that plant trying to protect you….or consume you?”
Iris thought on it and was sure there were so many implications to that question. Using botany has her basis for understanding them, she believed her dreams were the soil that they grew in.
They also idled as the viscous quality of the gauze. Could it be used to mend the two halves of the Eye of Light and Darkness?
Together they cast Send Dream to Hsan. A vision of Amos, Iris, and Old Bundari having tea at a table with a subtle elder sign greeting Hsan and making a place for him at the table in the Library of Dreams. And there was…no response. Hsan was either in another realm or he was no more.
June 9, 1925
Iris and Charles returned to the Shanghai courier and the editor Anthony Chang somewhat sheepishly showed them three articles that he thought might satisfy their curiosity.
Anthony elaborated on some of them. The woman on lantern street said she claimed to see a giant bat. There was a white man seen leaving these locations just before the calamity. All things that put us on Jack Brady’s tail.
Colby and Catherine rented a small boat to go down the river to survey the Ho Fang warehouse. A large brick building partially built on wooden piling that extended over the river. An open roll up door to the docks revealed a few dozen warehouse workers and stevedores carrying goods between the warehouse and the various boats docked outside. The building was two stories tall with an attached office. All the windows were seven feet off the ground with bars on them. Catherine spotted [Critical success on a spot hidden roll] one warehouse worker bumped a crate inside and when the lid slid off it there were YITH ARTIFACTS within!!! Another work quickly hammered the crate shut, but she was sure of what she saw.
Catherine and Colby examined the various ways into the building: the windows (high and barred) the doors (heavy and surely locked at knight), coming up from underneath the wooden floor (from the river…a possibility)
On their way back Catherine brushed her hand on one of the wooden pilings and used pre-cognition to divine how sneaking into the building might work out.
The warehouse at night. Both as it is in an physical literal space and as a representational node in our investigation. Crates of materials and goods broken down into their most basic components: units of food, trade goods, textiles, etc.
Six men. Two on patrol. Four playing mahjong in front of a door with an ominous aura. As we entered Catherine sensed we were being watched by two women smoking cigarettes.
Catherine startled from her vision shouting fire as the last thing she saw was the burning embers of the cigarettes that looked to be burning into her. She stumbled off the boat and fell into the murky waters below.
Both the factory workers and Colby rushed to pull her out of the water but the workers got their faster. Catherine was still realign from the effects of future sight—remembering many horrific future visions including one where she was constrained in a swaying room, chloroform or some other more deadly chemical being forcibly administered as a cloth was pressed to her face… another inside an shell made of ice… and finally an opulent room full of luxury with a huge monolith she sensed behind her, but as she turned to look, the vision ended—and so she was quite at their mercy.
The men wanted to bring Catherine into the warehouse to recover, but Colby successfully played the hapless (and now embarrassed) tourist and extricated her before they could carry her inside!
Francois and Amos, accompanied by Li-Wen set off to find the Astrologer Mister Lung (as advertised in his classified:
Mr. Lung’s apartment was notable for the fresh coat of red paint and the many many Chinese characters inscribed around the frame (which Li-Wen translated as “The god of thunder orders the death of spirits”). Behind the building Francois heard the mewing of a cat, a scraggly Siamese that sidled up to Francois instantly.
Li-Wen knocked on the door several times before it was finally opened by a scraggly old man with a long beard wearing robes that looked like they were purchased in Chinatown, San Francisco. He was sweating heavily and looked as though he really didn’t want company, but hospitality dictated he couldn’t turn them away.
His one room apartment was a jumble of furniture, all designed to obstruct rather than invite. There were papers hanging from the walls and the ceiling, books everywhere, and a maze of furniture that caused those entering to take a circuitous path.
Francois, the high priest of Nodins, felt the power of Lung’s wards as he entered. It took a physical act of will and eventually he was held fast, unable to proceed further [Recurring power rolls needed till he failed and was blocked]. The cat stayed between his legs.
Mr. Lung kept beckoning them further and further into this liar and did not notice Francois had stopped (or if he did, he didn’t find it notable). Francois and Amos recognized occult signs all over the apartment, designed to ward off all kinds of evils.
Li-Wen’s uncle abruptly through silk slippers into a brazier and as they burst into flame Francois felt his own energy [mana points] drained. To Amos this looked like the man was accidentally casting spells he had cobbled together and tried to back out “It feels like we’re overstepping out welcome and the incense in here is overpower to me. Perhaps we should go some place else.”
Mr. Lung kept gesturing them to follow though, assuring that when they reach the back of his room, he could tell them all.
Amos tried to gracefully leave again “An inauspicious new moon is coming to us—” but he was cut off
“You speak to me about auspiciousness?” Lung retorted with wide eyes. “Fine, yes, let us meet again. I will meet you in 73 hours at a tea house.”
Mr. Lung drew a handful of fake bills from his robe and began to fling them at Amos and Francois [Francois continued to lose magic points] and then finally extracted themselves from the apartment, the cat left behind.
Outside the door Francois still felt his energy draining so the investigators started distancing themselves from the the apartment when the heard a scream from within.
The raced back and inside saw not a cat, but a terrible servitor demon with joints that bent the wrong way, standing over the fallen body of Mr. Lung.
Francois through his spear (disguised as a walking stick) and impaled the creature. Li-Wen screamed in terror. The demon dug his claws into the helpless form of Lung. Amos swung a might blow with his Sword of Dreaming.
The servitor’s form lost hold on our reality and evaporated into mist around Amos, but the damage hand been done and the Mr. Lung whispered his final words (in Chinese so Amos will have to it translated another time).
Francois, overwhelmed by the experience fled to to a place that felt safe, the waters of of a nearby canal, his bone spear clattering behind him on the tether. He dove into the waters to feel the calming presence of the abyss.
Amos chased after Francois and helped him out of the water (unclear if Francois actually could drown). They returned to the apartment but Li-Wen was gone. Amos investigated the apartment further and found the room at the back was an impossible cobbling together of spells that would, when the curtain was drawn over it, trap and destroy even a very powerful entity!
Finding Li-Wen
We gathered at the hotel and though there were many leads to follow, our principle urgency was to find Li-Chen. We believed [thanks to a hard success on a psychology roll] that she would be likely to go to a place that is both calming and that would help her understand what happened. We had told her that monasteries and temples were sometimes havens against evil, so we considered that maybe she would go to one of them.
Charles coordinated a search party. Cobly, Amos, and Iris starting from Mr. Lung’s apartment and fanning out from there; Charles, Francois, and Catherine to start looking at monasteries.
Eventually we found a monastery that looked like it was the sign of recent commotion. Several monks were standing outside trying to make sense of a recent event. Catherine approached and though they didn’t share a common language they were able to emote enough to communicate that a distressed woman had been here recently and two “friends” arrived and took her away.
In an utter fluke [01 rolled on a “do you notice this check”] Catherine detected the same smell of smoke she experienced in her vision of the future. The two women who had been watching her in the future. We could go ask people like Fergus Chin and Isoge about the two women, maybe find some leads, maybe track them down in time. But in time Li-Wen might be dead or worse. As the familiar smell wafted through the air, Catherine grabbed hold of Charles and said “this may be unpleasant, don’t let me hurt my self or others” and slipped into a trance dreaming of the future.
A rich estate in the old city. A strikingly beautiful older woman asking Li-Wen questions that moved from pleasant and comforting to…less so. Li-Wen did not immediately fold but she would in time as the questions become more intense. In the background there are Book and Artifacts of mythos on the shelves. There is great power here.
Catherine learned the address, the name of the older woman (Madam Lin), and what she was going to say when Li-Wen resisted “Now lets be reasonable, dear.”
She could not see, but somehow knew that this vision was a point of confluence from her past vision. The ornately adorned room with the great monolith was in this house.
We drove to the estate and found it was a compound surrounded by a high wall and with many, very attractive and capable people walking the grounds. The House of Quite Repose.
As we pulled up to the entrance, attractive people opened the door of our cars and greeted us warmly. Nails and Jimmy stayed in the car, but the rest of stepped out and breathed in the beauty around us.
“We’ve been expecting you” a handsome woman welcomed inside. Catherine couldn’t help but wonder how but decided not to say anything in case the were also Yith practitioners. At the entrance we gave up our weapons (so many weapons) except Francois who carried his spear as a walking cane and Amos who left his sword with Jimmy. Catherine brought in her Yith device. Amos introduced the group “We are friends of Li-Wen. We’re here to see her and Madam Lin”.
We were brought into an ornately decorated room (the same Catherine saw from her vision) and saw Li-Wen sitting placidly on the floor facing away from us. Sitting on chair above her, facing her (and us) was Madam Lin. “I am curious how you have sprung a trap before I have even set the bait.”
Colby ask why she would want to trap us. To talk to us? Well then there is no need for a trap as we are here to talk with her as well.
Charles rushed to Li-Wen to check on her. She was embarrassed for making a stupid choice and going with the women and being trapped here. She felt guilty but was glad that we were here.
Madam Lin to talk the group at large “You’ve been here a short time and already made friends and enemies. I want to know what you want.”
Iris told her “We have an enemy that goes by many names.” Amos followed “We know you’re watching one of their followers: Ho Fang.”
Catherine idly looked at the shelves and took in the books and artifacts there. She spotted a set of nine bronze bells and a golden (not inverted) anch that stood out. Nothing Yithian, but there was a complete first edition set of Jackson Elias that sparked her curiosity. She thumbed through it as the others talked.
“Ho Fang is a dangerous enemy to make. I could help you, but I would like something in exchange. Jack Brady has wronged me. He stole from me. The Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan. I want them back.”
“Did Brady kill Hsan?” Amos inquired.
“That would be difficult as he died thousands of years ago. Jack Brady is here, hiding. He has a collected a violent group call the New China Militia, but we have not been able to determine what the yare doing. Ho Fang seeks Brady as well. He has been a rival to my collections in the past.”
Amos told her “we believe we know what Jack Brady wants with the book. Those he works for may want the scrolls to be destroyed.” He was going out on a limb. We really don’t know the mind of Jack Brady, if he is still working for the cult, that is likely true.
“I don’t care about Brady. I want my books back, but if he has destroyed them, then he must die. I want very badly for my collection to be complete.”
We discussed our goals, to stop a global calamity but Madam Lin was not convinced. “I have no stake in your global calamity. You are trying to damn a river. I want to learn to swim. Get me the books and I will give you aid”
Catherine broke her silence “Now let’s be reasonable, dear. We are tools you will discard when we are no longer of use to you. You have advantages here that we will never have. You need to help us first.”
Quoting the very line that Madam Lin had not yet said back to her got her attention. “You have useful skills. I’d like you to work for me.”
Despite Charles showing great concern, Catherine agreed to apprentice to Madam Lin. When he implored her not to take unnecessary risks, she told him she believed the risks she took were very necessary.
“Ho Fang worships a god called The Bloated Woman. His servants wield sickles and favor dismemberment. The like the blood. He has a guest visiting him now, Carl Standard (who Amos and Iris recognized as a member of the Silver Twilight Lodge, an organization adjacent to Miskatonic University) and he expecting another American, who is crossing the Pacific ocean now on a ship named Laurentides.
Madam Lin asked Catherine to stay this night and begin her training and she was adorned with an emerald necklace. Catherine asked if a companion of hers could stay and Madam Lin said this was not a charity but allowed Amos (who is also very handsome and met Madam Lin’s standards) to stay as an apprentice as well.
On the way out Francois noticed that one artifact, with nine bronze bells engraved with winged creatures, that at first appeared to be dragons, was a object of power dedicated to Nodins.
Later than night
“I’m sorry, but also what the hell?” Li-Wen wanted to know what that horrible creature was and what was going on. Francois tried to explain to her the demon as best he could.
“I don’t have the tact to say this slowly. I want what you have. When I saw that bad cat, I wanted a bad cat of my own.”
Francois warned “You will be changed. You will have to make sacrifices.”
Li-Wen was determined “In case I haven’t made this clear. I don’t like the person I am. I don’t cage if I change. I’m in.”
Francois tried to tell her of the kinds of sacrifices that would be needed and the dangers, citing Roger Carlyle as an example of contact with a god that has gone wrong. He was still trying to warn her away from his path, feeling guilty for taking her down it.
He had given her many chances to back out, but when she persisted, he agreed to take her alone to the water, with assurances from him and the group that nothing untoward would happen. He would show her Nodins.
Nails complained that he hadn’t been able to shoot anyone in days. He really wanted to shoot those smug attendants at the House of Quiet Repose.
Iris inspected the sap from the plans to see what could be made of it using a kettle to boil reagents and Catherine’s machining tools, though she really needed a full chemistry lab. After some testing [and an extreme botany success] she realized the sap is too runny, it needs to coalesce with more emptions fed into it [Currently has 7 emotions, needs 15]. Iris pondered it more and dreamed kaleidoscope dreams.
Descending the Depths
Francois told Li-Wen about the Nodins as best as he could. “He can offer you protection…and the abilty to hurt people.” She recoiled at the notion of someone changing her but continued. “Nodins is the only god I’ve encountered that is prepared to fight forces that would end humanity.”
“Catherine told me I should butter you up by saying I want to save the world.”
“She would say that.”
“I’m human and I want humans to exist. Show me what to do.”
Francois realized he could induct Li-Wen, as many cultists have done in the past, by showing her his god. He believed that to win this war we have to align ourselves with dangerous power, but he still felt guilty about what this means…another person losing their sanity, and maybe their humanity.
Then went to a secluded place on the docs and Francois helped Li-Wen learned the spell to contact Nodins [Hard success, which is needed to learn a spell!]. Before she had even fully learned the spell, Francois could see that she was immediately beginning to cast it. He helped her with this as well [paying enough sanity that he went indefinitely insane, but that’s a future Francois problem].
The sunk into the waters. They stepped into the mist. The visited the realm of Nodins. Francois noticed that he appeared as a Chinese man to Li-Wen, but as he always had to Francois. He believed that he likely had still never seen his true form.
Nodins seemed to be having two private conversations with both of them simultaneously. To Francois “You have done well to bring me another.”
Francois asked Nodins to expand his mind so that he could better understand magic. He offered to give up his physical form for this gift [Appearance]. Nodins touched Francois as he touched Li-Wen, giving an unknown gift to her as well.
They woke and Francois saw his reflection in the water. His brain has been physically grown, grotesquely enlarging his skull, and in many places the cracked bone showed through the skin. He was hideous [-30 Appearance down to 5, but +20 Intelligence].
Li-Wen noticed something of her own and just began laughing.
House of Quiet Repose
Amos and Catherine started being pampered. Baths, saunas, cleansing, manicures and pedicures, an incredible spa treatment. The donned the silk robes that everyone in the house wore. The had the symbol of the swallow (Madam Lin’s symbol) on the back.
Amos asked if the other staff if they found any contracts because the beauty of this place and the horror associated with some of the artifacts Madam Lin collects. The believed that there was no disharmony there. If these items are truly heinous than Madam Lin makes the world a better place by taking them for her own collection.
They were reintroduced to Madam Lin who told them “You will be be comfortable here and bring comfort to others.” [We had some out of game discussion to confirm that while sex works happens here, that isn’t what was expected from us.]
“You have deiced to apprentice to me, I respect this. If you try to deceive or to harm me, you will be destroyed.” Madam Lin spent the night showing us the grounds, experiencing rooms filled different smells, different textures, different sounds. We practices the art of quiet observation.
The robes have a place for a truncheon and for darts that would be concealed within their folds. Catherine placed her Mark 2.0 device in the pocket for the truncheon. Noticing this, Madam Lin asked her about the device, which she explained as a tool that helped bring us to her. We also offered her some of the texts that we held and she took interest in one of them.
We woke felling perfectly rested, though we would not remember sleeping (and Catherine only had hazy memoires of the the time they were awake). They felt incredible. The returned to the the hotel with their companions dressed in a fine Chinese suit (Amos) and emerald green dress (Catherine).
Moments after the arrived in the height of splendor, Francois and Li-Wen burst in startling us all “My god, what happened to you?”
“Nodins gave me a great gift. He had to fit in in somehow.” And that was all we spoke of that.
Li-Wen said she had been a fool. It was so easy. I was right there in front of her all along. Why hadn’t the rest of us followed the path? “Nodins saw the potential in me and I saw the power in him that I could not previously fathom.”
Amos told her that there were book she should read to learn more, but she protested that she would learn from her god directly.
June 10, 1925
There was another day before our scheduled meeting with Brady and we did not want to break into Ho Fang’s warehouse or approach the New China Militia until we talked to him, so we decided to spend another day investigating what we could. What happened at the Garden of the Purple Cloud, the Seamen’s Club, and on Lantern Street.
Amos and Francois, who yesterday looked like amiable companions now looked strikingly different from each other (Beauty and the Beast), went to the Town Gods Temple to inquire about the Garden of the Purple Cloud. Li-Wen went as their translator. The found several Buddhists monks including a Bonze greeting people at the entrance.
The asked about the scholars who died in the fire. The Bonze told them he didn’t know why they gathered that day, but they were with an American man (identified by photo as Brady). They were scholars of Chinese literature, but not celebrities. The Bonze offered to make inquires about what they were studying and forward it along.
“The man Brady was here when the fire broke out. It was a terrible fire. Life is suffering, we must navigate through it.”
The were given a tour of the burned pavilion and could see all the telltale signs of a fire that burned too hot, too fast. The same magic that was used by Taun Kaur.
Charles and Catherine went to the Seamen’s Club and saw there was still damage that hadn’t been repaired. A local raconteur who was fond of his own voice told them it was “Fish men! They came lout of the water as the building collapsed! Bulbous eyes, scaly skin. Horrible!”
We learned from the host of the club that just before the incident there was a white man named Hiram Johnson (though with pictures we identified him as Brady) who was staying there until just before the incident. [Internal note, all of Brady’s pseudonyms are California Governors…we should use that to look for him].
At 88 Lantern Street Iris and Colby were greeted by very attentive young women who invited Colby in and mostly ignored Iris. They asked what his pleasure would be, but he made it clear, he just wanted to know about what happened to Reparita Wong. The madam of the house Aunti Gi told him “It was terrible. She was torn to shreds. She just started, it was her first night! The man who died heard her screams and ran in to help. He died too.”
After more inquiry they realized Reparita used to work at the Quivering Jade House. But the previous occupant of the room was Choi Mei-Ling, who only had one client, an American (yep, you guessed it). She had gone to the Magenta Joy House at 140 Lantern Street.
And so Iris and Colby went to 140 Lantern Street where they were lied to by the man who ran the house who said he introduced them to Choi but had just found another woman believing they woudln’t know the difference. Colby noticed the difference. He thanked the woman, who has mostly been non-responsive to the photo and their questions (translanted by the owner) and then told them man “I told you to show me Choi Mei-Ling. That was not her. Tell me where she was or I will break both of your arms. First this arm, then that arm. And if you scream, I’ll cut out your tongue.
The man begged for mercy “They made me promise not to say anything. I had to do it. I sold her to the men with sickles.” When asked about Brady the proprietor told them “He visited her once when she was here. They (the men with sickles) seek him, not her.” When we asked where she might be, he said “When he (Ho Fang) has enemies, he brings them close…into his home.”
That day Jimmy also got the manifest for the Laurentides (the ship Madam Lin told us about, which haughty Francois was exasperated that we could not pronounce correctly)…..M’dari’s name was on the manifest.
Thoughts on the game
“M’daaaaaaaaari!” said with the same inflect as James T. Kirk yelling “Khaaaaaaaan”, We can’t let him meet Ho Fang! How do we intercept him? And once we do, how do we stop him?
Man, Brady has a lot of enemies. I don’t think he caused all those calamities, simply because most sorcerers pick a theme (fish men or giant bats or living fire, but not all three) and stick to it. If Brady could summon all three, he would be the big threat we need to stop!
Insufferable Francois is such a delight. We only got a bit of him at the end of the session, but I think that is such a smart way to handle indefinite insanity. I hope that a character that is hideous and haughty is still fun for James to play. And if not, I’m confident we can make accommodations in game (more hats) and out of game (talking about what makes the game feel cohesive and consistent while still being something we all want to engage with).
Wow, this one session and so much changed. I’m not sure if working for Madam Lin is a good idea. I’m really not sure if inducting Li-Wen into the priesthood or Francois’ “gift” from Nodins was a good idea. The dynamics of the group are likely going to change, but I am hopeful this will mean more roleplaying opportunities to learn about each other.
I’m sad that we couldn’t save Mr. Lung, but sometimes the dice give you 01 results to recognize cigarette smoke, and sometimes they fail Mythos rolls over and over to realize the scraggly cat at your feet is draining your power to fight off wards. Sam portrayed Mr. Lung as very paranoid and using all the means at his disposal to ward off evil…we just mistook the evil he was warding off for Francois!
As always I had a delight getting up to sneaking around shenanigans with Colby at the warehouse. Yes, Catherine fell in the murky water, but it worked out okay in the end. She got an even more elegant dress from Madam Lin. I’m imagining something with a high collar and beautiful embroidery.
