The new Savage Worlds adventure is a sci-fi adventure game, sort of a mashup of hard SF and other influences like Gamma World, Fallout and Cormac McCarthy’s story, The Road — details at the Vancouver Roleplayers’ Collective Meetup group. If you’re in my hood, feel free to check it out. I’m pretty stoked.

Though I’m less than stoked that all of the Pinterest images I threw onto this blog are now toast. Seriously… I’m going back to Flickr.

I think part of it was disappointment that the novels didn’t really reflect a typical gaming session. That instinct was soon followed by an equally strong hunch that basing fiction off a typical gaming session would be awful — sort of like the James Bond flicks that I hated before Daniel Craig took over, full of explosions and short on plot, character and the most important elements of actual stories.

Since I started gaming in plot-point defined Savage Worlds campaigns involving deeply flawed characters, roleplayed by people who seem to want to convey micro-stories themselves, I’m finding that the games are actually inspring good stories worth writing; not fanfic and not game summaries, but actual, original fiction that takes bits and pieces from game days. This makes me happy.

If you’ve checked out some of the older posts on this site, you can read some of my earlier game-inspired fiction. I’m also writing stuff over at The Island of Misfit Stories

Enjoy.

Why go with classic Marvel superhumans rather than generic supers? Using established, iconic villains (and an even more established, famous superhero adversary) means everyone’s already on roughly the same page with the kind of world we’re using, even if none of the Players (or myself) have actually read a comic book in about 20 years. Set up for character powers and motivations is easy. Pick some appropriate Power Trappings, Hindrances and Edges and we’re off to the races. 

As a GM, how am I going to run this Sinister Six campaign in terms of plot? In the comic books I read as a kid, I remember the Sinister 6 attacked Spidey one at a time to wear him down… which didn’t work very well for them. It also would be quite lame for an RPG; I don’t want to split the party five times, each time ending in defeat.

No, no. That will never do… but it does inspire one possible plot point line:

The Sinister Six got up to their old tricks and the first villains to draw the short straws have already gone down to defeat at the hands of the infinitely resourceful Spider-Man (and quite possibly, his Amazing Friends).

My gaming group only has 3-4 Players anyway — 6 is too many, so they get to be whichever villains they want to be and the others are smoked right at the start.

Our heroes, er, villains, suddenly realize: attacking Spider-Man one at a time is stupid. So the adventure starts with a conversation that’s probably something like this:

“Doctor Octopus and Sandman are already punch-drunk, stuck to a brick wall and waiting for the NYC cops to show up,” says Electro, who is nervously chewing on his fingernails, throwing off sparks everywhere. “How shocking.”

“I thought Octopus’ plan was a good one,” says Mysterio. “Apparently, that was an illusion.”

“That’s it!” shouts Kraven the Hunter. “My savage heart cries out for action. Let’s set up an ambush for Spider-Man at the Zoo.”

“There’s a Zoo in Manhattan?” the Vulture interjects.

“It’s in Central Park, you senile, doddering fool!” Kraven replies.

“That place?” the Vulture interjects again. “It’s not much of a Zoo. It’s not very big.”

“Where is your animal spirit?” Kraven shouts. “Fine. New plan. We find out Spider-Man’s secret identity, kidnap someone he cares about and force him to take off his mask before we all mop the floor with him.”

“That sounds like a lot of work!” the Vulture argued back. “I’m a thief! If I wanted to work that hard, I’d hang up these wings and get a straight job!”

“In Obama’s America?” Electro asked. “Good luck with that, old timer. But seriously, I think Kraven’s on to something here. It’s not a bad plan…”

Kraven thinks it’s going to be a tough day ahead if they’re going to snare the most dangerous game: radioactive-spider bitten man.

And while they’re planning, the most popular superhero in the world is out there looking for them, so they better hurry it up…

And that’s how the adventure begins. Do the most dastardly villains in Manhattan have what it takes to finally beat Spidey (probably not, but they’ll give it their best college try).

This post was written for the second annual New Year, New Game blog carnival hosted by Gnome Stew as part of the 2013 New Year, New Game challenge.

As for you, well… you think I couldn’t hear what you were doing in the next room? With these ears?

You’re a terrible roommate. You sicken me. Leave now.

The last time we used the fantasy Wild Cards Oranic the Wizard and Klothar the Barbarian, the pair of adventurers were in dire straits. Well, worse than dire — we scrambled their molecules in a magical equivalent of a small-scale nuclear blast (explained in the blog post, He Murdered Me). I always felt a little guilt about GM-ing the Total Party Kill, so bringing back these characters for a new adventure was a nice opportunity to undo some bad karma.

I like the idea of bringing back old characters for sequels (or prequels — in this case, it was a little of both, tying into another GM’s fantasy campaign we’d run with different characters). It gives you a reason to hold on to those old character sheets, in case the GM finds inspiration months or even years later. Even if you never do use those characters again, it’s nice to think that their stories might continue someday. If you play long enough, there will come a time when you’ll want to revisit the game world that seemed so fresh and new, exploring roads less traveled.

Here are my notes for a Plot Point fantasy campaign for Savage Worlds bringing back our old heroes as slaves of that classic D&D monster, the Sahuagin (or if you prefer Call of Cthulhu, call ‘em the Deep Ones):

Sea Devils. Savage Worlds Plot Point Campaign

1. ARENA. Our heroes were teleported to the underwater Sahuagin city Tlaxaca by the magical blast that destroyed the Tarasque. After entering the “Slave Gate” the Sahuagin’s sorcerers use to get new slaves for their arena or other purposes, the heroes have spent a year fighting in Superbowl gladiator-type contests (The area is magically enhanced to give landborne creatures the ability to breathe and swim around with relative ease). 5,000 spectators watch. The Sahuagin’s King Webja wants the PC’s dead, since their continued presence is causing unease among his people.

He has set up an uneven match between a captured Lizard Man plus two humans and a third party of 4-armed Sahuagin riding sharks. What the king doesn’t know is that the Lizard Men include the powerful wizard (pre-Lich) LIZARIA, who has come to this place to steal King Webja’s magic. He WANTS to be there.

LIZARIA may telepathically contact the players to get them to distract the Sahuagin gladiators (or kill them) while he brings down the house.

2. KRAKEN! LIZARIA has summoned a Kraken to take down the arena. The magical “glass” roof that retains the water-breathing magic is breaking up. LIZARIA and his men are going after KING WEBJA. The Players realize they must flee the arena during the chaos (Some Sahuagin are attacking the KRAKEN but most are fleeing in terror). They must find out where the “Slave Gate” is and operate it to get out!

3. LOCKER ROOM. Players encounter slaves and slave masters in a melee combat. It’s about an even fight, but reinforcements could arrive at any time. The Players must somehow get through the area. At this time, they will begin to notice black slime growing through the water behind them, moving like in a lava lamp. They must somehow discover or stumble upon the SECRET TUNNEL.

4. SECRET TUNNEL to the SLAVE GATE. After closing the door behind them to keep the black slime away, they get into this phosphorescent tunnel. This tunnel was abandoned by the Sahuagin because an ABOLETH has taken up residence. Players must overcome this giant, tentacled, illusion-causing monstrosity. It casts illusions of something to make the characters want to come forth (Treasure? Wailing babies? Hot women?) before they are grabbed by the tentacles.

5. SLAVE GATE room. The Wizard (or smartest alternative) must figure out how to use the SLAVE GATE in reverse to get back home while the black goop threatens to envelope them all. A Sahuagin sorcerer is using a wall spell to keep the slime back. A successful Arcane or Knowledge roll gets our Heroes back to Oerth — in feudal Japan — otherwise, with many Raises, they appear at the site of their battle with the TARRASQUE.

To make this blog a bit more useful to readers, we’re also thinking of publishing more Plot Point Campaign summaries, character stats, maps — basically, offering a bit more value for our fellow gamers. No promises on any kind of regularity for that, but we’ll do what we can.

While all articles on this site thus far have been written by members of our Vancouver-based gaming group, we’d be happy to publish guest articles by fellow Savage Worlds players and GMs. Contact us, you Savage, you.

While we’re looking forward to a Savage 2013, we thought it would be nice to also take a look back at some of our favorite articles of 2012. Here goes:

• Nobody Fucks With The Jesus. Getting Your Way in Savage Worlds. Persuasion rolls for Pacifists.
  
• GM Tip. Get Inside Your Players’ Brains. Mind Flayers rule!
• Walking in the Promised Land. Fleshing out the backstory of our Pacifist Priest in a Weird West campaign.
• Aliens Meets the Martian Chronicles Meets John Carter Meets Savage Worlds. A full Sci-Fi Plot Points one-shot campaign for Savage Worlds.
• Extended Campaigns vs. One-Shot Adventures. Which do you prefer?
• Playing Savage Worlds Remotely & How Role Playing Can Happen Over The Internet. It’s easy and it works.
• Using Pre-Generated Characters in Savage Worlds. It’s just about mandatory.
• The Story of Grimm the Lizard-Wizard. A backstory of a mean old Saurian sorcerer.
• He Murdered Me. The trauma of in-game death.
• Prisoners! Welcome to Lost Haven. The introduction (read aloud at the beginning of the adventure) to a Fifty Fathoms Plot Point campaign.

Until next time, stay Savage, people!

Our gaming group took a break from Savage Worlds and delved into this treasure from Ali’s childhood. The arm-wrestling interlude, burping contest and scary face competition could not salvage this abortion-in-a-box. Suffice to say, it did not live up to the nostalgia factor.

Whenever I get around to GM-ing again, I plan to run a Savage Worlds campaign loosely based off the World of Darkness “Vampire: the Requiem” game. It’s going to be bloody good (Sorry. Couldn’t resist).

I used to play the “Vampires: the Masquerade” game back in the 1990s when it first came out. It was fun, but I often felt that actual gameplay didn’t live up to its potential (Whether I was GM-ing or as a Player). I almost want to prove to myself that this game can be not merely good, but awesome. The campaign will be a success if we can avoid some of the problems from my past experiences.

Back in the day, I usually wanted a political game with some ultra-violence thrown in. A pair of Players always wanted to play out their real-life romance in-game. Another player basically wanted to be Wolverine from the X-Men. None of our styles or backstories meshed.

It didn’t help that we usually couldn’t schedule gaming sessions more often than once every couple of months, which killed any momentum we were building (I tried to counter this by running single-session epic campaigns over 6 or 7 hours — which not everyone was up for. Even as late teens, some of us had lives to get to; my pleadings to have patience for just another hour or two so we could finish were not met with sympathetic ears).

One last problem was the predictability of the stories. Since our Players’ personal goals were usually so diverse, the GM (myself included) would often take the lowest common denominator for plot motivations: survival. Most games ended up as big slug-fests with other Vampires or other supernatural creatures. Sometimes we’d completely ignore our characters’ stated desires and just go hunting for trouble.

Still, I always thought that with the right group, more attention paid to the characters’ (and NPC’s) motivations and a somewhat (but not entirely) plot-oriented approach, Vampire could be mind-blowingly awesome. The (potential) focus on personal development for characters lends itself to exploring big themes: redemption, vengeance, romance, etc… These are far more exciting goals than the mere acquisition of gold pieces and XP (the only alternative on offer from RPGs back in the early 1990s). Throw in the novel hook of actually playing the game as blood-drinking, inhuman monsters, holding on to some shred of their former humanity, and you’ve got good times.

Anyone out there have any experience running a Vampire-themed Savage Worlds campaign want to offer some advice or observations? Leave a comment.