Erratica Reduex

Note: this game is free to download, up through November 25th.  that is, today and tomorrow. 

As if you didn't have enough of being at work 40+ hours a week.  MSG is an indie, resource-based narrative rpg of working for a ruthless conglomerate a hundred years from now, where coming up with a marketing plan and backstabbing your boss is even more important than gunplay. 

Like many indie games, MSG pushes he boundaries of what "RPG means.  It has some interesting indie ideas, such as one player taking the role of the corporation in each  turn, non-traditional stats (Self,  Compassion, a person you love, someone you hate, a dark secret, etc..) and a limited game play where the goal is to actually win over the corporation and the other players.   Self and Compassion are the main stats that give you a dice pool that you risk to succeed on the various unethical tasks the corporation gives you, your additional traits give you more points you can risk, and the player to end the game with the most of his dice pool left, wins the game.  Beyond that, there are a number of mechanics to give the feel of a company, such as resources, brand name and values, and if the company does badly enough, buyouts.

In tone and feel, it's like a very cynical, cyberpunk soap opera, in that the personal elements the players choose are built upon to make a story.  In fact, the additional points one can gain through bringing up say, one's dark secret are called soap.  Like other narrative RPGs , the actual role-playing appears to be subsumed into making a story and the personality mechanics; in fact, the situations are supposed to be narrated, not acted out..  As a result, the game itself is as slick, attractive, and cold as the companies it satirizes, a feeling enhanced by the graphics and between-chapter vignettes.

But what the hell, in the best of free-market principals, the game is free for a limited time only.  So one might as well download the PDF.

Yep, I've given up trying to find a local game group with an opening, or unaffiliated players who can match schedules.  I've got two brand new players- two cute hyperactive young sisters- that  I'm teaching D&D to from the ground up.  

They're pretty fast learners too: in a short session last night I taught the two of them how roll up characters, using the 4D6- drop lowest method, and then ran a quick test combat where one of them got a critical hit, and the other made a good saving throw vs. a fireball.  Their reactions were good too: Alice paid close attention to the rolling dice and batted one with her paw, and Dorothy while initially shying away from the D20, came back and stared intently for a full minute before wandering away under the table.

I'm thinking that D&D may be more fun for them than either the laser pointer or balls of yarn.  So things are looking up, gaming-wise.

This insult sounds perfectly reasonable: 

"I've got dice older'n you!"

And you know, I think I might have some 20 year-old dice floating around somewhere...

Let's see...in retrospect, taking the kitties to be neutered the day after Dundracon, and then starting a new heavy-learning-curve job the next day wasn't the best idea. I'm wiped, and will barely be able to crawl into the weekend. The kitties sudden notion that "Of course daddy (not mommy, she needs to sleep) will want to wake up and play "Pounce on Dad" at 5:30 in the morning!"isn't helping. I'm thinking it's some sort of strange revenge on their part.

Oh yeah, there was a con. I barely got into any of the games I was interested in, partially due to lack of tactics on my part (i.e. trying to crash games I wasn't picked for), an annoying last-minute announcement of game players, and the need to go down and feed the kitties twice during the weekend. So only three games (along with a couple games of Lunch Money). But the three games WERE interesting.

Friday night: After some alcohol and lunch Money, I crashed the playtest demo of Mecha vs. Kaiju, the True20 game about well, giant robots, and giant-er monsters. It was a lot of fun, though the RPing wasn't top notch. It was a great intro to the setting and system, both of which impressed me enough to buy the True20 book. About which thee will be more later. The game actually went seven of the eight allotted hours, so I ended up stumbling into bed at 3AM.

Saturday: I did some shopping, immediately picking up true20, My Life Life With Master, and a bargain bin version of Albedo. I consider that a good haul, and was pleasantly surprised to see RXM thought that MLWM was incredibly well written, dramatic and sad. I'll have to run a quick game soon. I then had to make a run down to San Jose to feed the kitties, and clean up the massive amount of water they had spread around. Damned reservoir water dish. I got back just in time for...the wrong game. Somebody scheduled me in a game that was NOT my choice. Which actually turned out well, because I ended up in...

...The Team Volari City of Heroes superhero game. Which was massively kickass. I ended up as one of the few non-powered people at a superhero conference, a Senator devoted to making the conference go smoothly...so later on the army could invade. For some reason, probably due to heat exhaustion (coat, tie, unventilated room- do the math), my goals went from "Make conference go smoothly so the war can start on schedule" to "Make war start right here and now by turning everyone on each other." At one point while I was tearfully explaining to the guy with no memory that the girl over there not only had done awful experiments on him, but that, (Gasp! HORROR!), a GM walked by, and hung around. I only found out later that the GM was having trouble cracking up and the massive amount of BS I was feeding the guy. Which is why I won a prize- truly I was shocked.

Sunday. More shopping. Second LARP- a superhero game based on Brave New World (the rpg, not the book). I was a reporter at a conference to discuss a "superhero registration act", and a bit disgruntled because I had no powers. Until I suddenly did, briefly, and used them to try to assassinate a senator. What's worse than having no powers? Discovering you have uncontrollable powers? How about discovering that you're a mind-controlled assassin for an evil villain who holds all the cards? Again the game was fun, though I couldn't help feeling that there was really no way to stop the bad guy. Pity there won't be a sequel, what with the villain starting W.W.III and all.

And then I went to feed the cats, and then went to collapse. I was interrupted by amywithani and palecur, who treated me to wine and celebrations for my new job. Having fantastic friends like them is a new experience I definitely want to get used to. I slipped into a brief coma, woke up long enough to stumble over to Team Volari for some mead, and to mock some music videos, and then I crashed hard.. Monday there was no game, but there was a brunch, and then a trip home to cats who were NOT speaking to the parents who abandoned them, no sir.

So , a few games, way too much shopping, and hanging out with really cool people. I think I'll be back next year.

I'm serious- this should really be titled "Seven Deadly Chambers of Awesome", though it's actually called "Knights of Cydonis", by the band muse.

So why is awesome? Because it's in the form of a movie (and at six minutes packs as much story as some two-hour movies I've seen), that has homages to every type cheesy Saturday-afternoon film I used to watch: bad chop-socky movies; Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns; Planet of the Apes; Buck Rogers...it's a stripped down Kill Bill with the volume turned up to 11.

It's also what any game of Feng Shui or Rifts I play in should look like. Seriously.