Morgan's KublaCon 2019 Excellent Adventures

The shuffler changed this year to a pre-shuffle before the convention. It worked out very well for me as I got into 5 games with the shuffler, crashed one game, and ran one game. Knowing my schedule, I was also able to get into two seminars: one on Alternate History for RPGs and another by the War College on First Blood at Bull Run.

I had an excellent KublaCon, one of the best, if not the best, in many years.

This year, I'm going to focus on what Players bring to a game and how they can affect it.

I hide spoiler sections with JavaScript. If you have JavaScript turned off, you can skip the spoiler sections I have marked.

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Friday 10am (4 hrs)

The Tearing of the Veil
System: Unknown Armies, 3rd Ed.
GM: Todd Furler
Players: 6 (Dovi A, Gil T, Matt S, Martin C, Patrick R, Morgan Hua)

A small town experiences more than its share of violence. Random chance? Or something sinister, just out of sight? Weave together stories separated by three decades to find the answers.

I really enjoy Todd's games because he shoves a 6 to 8 hr game into 4 hrs. He runs cinematic games, explaining things with cinematic nomenclature such as what does the audience see, the camera angle, sometimes explaining the purpose of a scene with minimal direction. He knows when to cut a scene and when to let it run it's course.

The game jumps between the past and present day to bring everything to a climax.

This was a well done game and a lot of fun.

Some people like Todd's GMing style and some do not. He has tight table control and those who do not want to go with his flow will not like his style and feel too constrained. Luckily, our table were full of Todd veterans and we knew what was expected. It was a good table of RPGers who brought this game to life.

An excellent game.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

This game is basically Todd's version of Stephen King's IT. A bunch of kids meet some horror and they change, some lose memories, and all gain some supernatural power. This time the horror isn't an ancient evil clown, but The King of the Forest complete with demons and hounds of hell.

The scenes start in the present day and flash back into the past which start to explain all the problems the adult versions of the kids have.

Once all that has transpired before is explained, the adults have now gathered together to confront the evil and destroy it.

My favorite bits:

Matt's Hunter kills a peeping tom who is masterbating in the bushes. Is it a demon or just a kid?

Matt's Hunter is lecturing at college and Gil's Detective and Demon partner show up. The Demon partner handcuffs the exit doors so they can't be opened.

Everything with Dovi's alcoholic Cop.

There's a scene where my Astral projecting Escapee from the Asylum (wearing stolen clothing and no shoes, looking like a looney homeless person) finds Matt's Hunter (with amnesia of the past) and Gil's Detective at a cafe and cause a commotion. Just as I get dragged out of the cafe, I scream out: "The King of the Forest is coming!" And memories slam into the Hunter's head.

"Tricking" the Detective to go to the TREE, telling him that's where the other bodies are.

The TREE with faces of children who satisfied The King of the Forest are embedded in the TREE, his honor roll memoriam, the ones who ran the best with fear. Those who didn't satisfy him were fed to his Hell Hounds and their bones fertilized the TREE.

The final fight was very cinematic. Everyone brought air rifles with tranquilizer darts, the only thing that can take down demons (not bullets), except for my Escapee who opted for a spray bottle of acid. He wanted an axe, but another PC was better with it, so he had to give it up. Everything came in handy, especially the Axe, in the final fight.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Friday 2pm (1 hr)

Alternate History in RPG Settings
Seminar
Panel: Darren Watts (Moderator), Jess Nevins, Nick Cole

What if Hitler and the Third Reich won World War II? What if the USSR landed on the moon first? What if Nero was never a Roman Emperor?

Our panelist discuss alternate timelines and how those can be woven into a roleplaying game.

It was an interesting discussion with only 4 people in the audience, so it was more of a round table discussion than a presentation.

Some takeaways:

It's better to decide your endpoint and what you want that is cool, such as Kaiju during WW2 and work what needs to change to have it happen vs working your way forward with a what if Hitler was raised to be not Anti-Semitic. e.g. it's easier to work backward ripples vs forward ripples in building out your world.

Be watchful of sensitivity issues which is prevalent these days which can lead to blowback such as labeling who is evil. This devolved into an argument about killing Orcs in Tolkien = Nazis. Who is EVIL. Good vs Evil and shades of grey. Tolerance. Beware of blanket statements. Klingons used to be evil, but not anymore.

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Friday 6pm (6 hrs)

To Write Thine Own Doom
System: Call of Cthulhu, 7th Ed.
GM: Arthur Wallis
Players: 6 (full table with Matt S, Morgan Hua)

England, 1085 A.D., King William's peace endures, and he wishes to survey his realm. For the task of the census of Manchester, he has assigned a Noble Knight, who along with his retinue shall compile information on the local farms and hamlets etcetera. 

These great works will be compiled into the liber de wintonia. The Doomsday book. 

Unfortunately, there are old things awakening in Northern England. Things which remember the Romans, and even a time before. Things which consider the region very much theirs, and mean to reclaim it...

An interesting game, but slightly ruined by a infamous bad player - who crashed the game. This player was difficult, arguing with other players, spouting nonsense, using up screen time on pointless tasks.

The game was chock full of scenes and interesting events, but the distraction by the bad player really derailed the game. We didn't get to the 3rd act of the game and basically the world ended. Arthur said he play tested this many times and we were the very first group not to get to the 3rd act.

Without this player, we would have had a much better experience.

Arthur will put this scenario on KickStarter soon.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

We're camp followers of Bertrand de Verte, a knight of King William. Bertrand and his scribe go on a short day trip, but doesn't return. Only his scribe returns, mortally wounded, so we go to rescue Bertrand.

This is akin to Gulliver's Travel / Mysterious Island. We follow his trail and stranger and stranger things happen. Culminating in the Snails of Hale, giant snails attacking the town of Hale.

We missed out on the 3rd act where we're supposed to save the world, but didn't.

My personal favorite bits (I played a priest, a religious zealot):

Flagellating a priest caught having sex in a church.

Saving the town of Hale by leading them out of Lilliput.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sat 10am (6 hrs)

The Forcing Move
System: Call of Cthulhu, 7th Ed.
GM: Morgan Hua
Players: 6 (full table with Cro M)

Cold War Cthulhu: You work for MI6 and covertly for Section 46, a secret group fighting the "Other Enemy" (Mythos entities). 

Date/Location: 1972 at the World Chess Championship in Reykjavik, Iceland. 

MI6 mission: Prevent a Russian double-agent from defecting. 

Section 46 mission: Assess and neutralize the Other Enemy's influence on Bobby Fischer. Do NOT terminate Bobby Fischer.

I had a good table of players and enjoyed running this game. What makes this interesting is that PCs are given two missions, sometimes the missions intersect, sometimes not, sometimes the two missions may be contrary to each other, so agents have to choose between loyalty to their agency or to Section 46.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

My favorite bits:

One agent tried to break into a supply closet to disguise herself as a maid, but critically failed and left her lockpick broken in the lock, so then she just choked out a maid and took her uniform and supply cart instead.

This same agent spotted a KGB agent following someone and decided to throw knives at him and got a critical success, killing him with 3 throwing knives on her first attack. What a killer lady.

PCs lay in wait for bad guy to return. Outside spotter, sees bad guy return from shopping, who pulls out shotgun from the trunk of his car before entering his house. I asked the spotter if he's going to do anything, he said, no. Bad guy kicks in the door and opens fire, killing one PC and injuring two others with his shotgun, then two other PCs laying in wait on either side of the door attack him; one garrotts him, but the other fumbles and whacks the other PC in the head. After a struggle, they finally put down the bad guy.

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Sat 6pm (6 hrs)

Indiana Jones And The City of Impossible Angles
System: Call of Cthulhu, Pulp Cthulhu.
GM: William Lee
Players: 6 (full table with Gil T, Cro M, Morgan Hua)

The year is 1940. The Nazis are masters of Europe, and they may soon be masters of the world. There are terrifying rumors that the Nazis have discovered clues to the location of an ancient Nameless City filled with lost technologies so wondrous that they defy the understanding of modern science. With the eldritch secrets they could loot from the Nameless City, the Nazis would be unstoppable.

Now, Indiana Jones and his friends must beat the Nazis to the Nameless City before unspeakable horrors are unleashed upon the world!

INDIANA JONES AND THE CITY OF IMPOSSIBLE ANGLES is a Call of Cthulhu 7th edition adventure using the Pulp Cthulhu supplement published by Chaosium. The players will step into the roles of Indiana Jones, Marion Ravenwood, Sallah, Marcus, Short Round, Willie Scott, and Dr. Henry Jones, Sr. and embark on a sanity-blasting, Nazi-punching adventure to save the world! 

My favorite game for this convention.

A very cinematic game. William controls the table not as tightly as Todd Furler, but still uses cinematic tropes (but not as much), so there's more freedom to envision the pulp action your own way.

Gil's Marcus with his antics with Henry Jones were a big highlight of this game. I got to also get my Short Round in. "Doctor Jones, Save Us!"

And no surprise, the big set piece is The City of Impossible Angles. 😀

An excellent game.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

In this game, the player playing Indiana Jones was a newbie to CoC, a D&D player. So, I think he was a bit cowed by the free-wheeling nature of pulp. So our Indy was a bit muted. Coincidentally, I just read an article where Harrison Ford said Indy will retire with him and he did his own stunts. That may explain why our Indy was a bit slow, Harrison Ford is getting a bit too old to do his own stunts. 😎

My favorite bits:

The rope bridge: Short Round is hanging on the rope bridge, almost falling; Marion is grabbing Short Round and almost falling; Marcus fell through a rotten slat and is almost falling. Nazis are attacking us. "Dr Jones, Save Us!" Nothing happens. More stuff happens. Now Short Round is barely hanging on with Marion clinging onto Short Round. "Dr Jones, Save Us!" Finally, Indy uses his whip to pull Marion to safety.

Marcus falls on top of Henry and knocks both of them on the ground. "No time for that, Old Man," quipped Short Round.

Short Round water rafting down an underground river on top of a coffin lid, with Henry riding and Marcus barely hanging on to the back.

Hotel full of Nazis. Short Round throwing books at Nazis and knocking them out of a 5th story window. Meanwhile, Marcus is fighting with a firehose that has a mind of its own, blasting away at Nazis. Marion ineffectively fighting against a Hulk-like Nazis.

Short Round turning off a generator (turning off the lights) and opening fire with a submachine gun and missing all the Nazis and hitting everyone else in the party.

Short Round driving a tank and side swiping a T-Rex and knocking it into a portal to another dimension.

While everyone is killing Nazis, Indy spends several turns sneaking up on two remaining Nazis (GM repeatedly asking if he'd rather just shoot them, with him declining) and finally grabs one as a body shield while killing another one. Sallah then promptly guts the body shield with his knife.

The player playing Indy complaining after the game: "I didn't get to do anything." 😂

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Sun 10am (5 hrs)

Life in the Shadows

System: Breakdown

GM: Wilson Zorn

Players: 4 (2 players: Thomas and Morgan Hua)

This is a game about people on the edge, protagonists striving to do some kind of good in a painful, mad world, swimming against the increasing tide of man's inhumanity to fellow man. Life in the Shadows portrays the struggle of individuals in an increasingly Orwellian state. You play a spy, refugee, student, or such desperately seeking something. Please note this is a playtest. 

As a highly competent protagonist, you will engage your compassion or dispassion, each with attendant risks, to succeed. You must also learn to trust others, but always with a risk of betrayal.  

Useful references and inspirations include the lyrics to the Talking Heads' "Life During Wartime," the movie Brazil, news stories around the NSA and Snowden (especially through the lenses of insiders and those on the fringe), and (in a non-comedic vein) the RPG Paranoia.  

FYI the rules system is significantly informed by Don't Rest Your Head, with a little bit of Mountain Witch.

In this game, only one other player showed up, so imagine a storytelling game with only two players. The other player was young and an avowed D&D player. To my surprise he was very good and I had a very good time playing this game.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

The setting is a Big Brother society. When a family member goes missing, a "black star" is placed on that family's window to show that someone has disappeared. Also if you witness a crime and don't report it, you will receive 1/2 the sentence the guilty person gets. And it's illegal to turn off electronics that can track you. e.g. cell phones, computer monitors, etc..

I decided to mold my character after Robert De Niro's Duct Repairman in Brazil. He was an off the grid repairman who used discontinued and unorthodox methods (doesn't follow the required repair manual) to fix air conditioning and furnaces. He was named Brad DeNiro and "Looked like someone famous."

The other player decided he'd be a college student making extra money as a medical guinea pig.

The story focused on an anti-gov group that wanted to steal the experimental tech inside the other player's character. I befriend him and have seen people "black starred" by persons unknown and accidentally overheard the anti-gov group's plot to grab my friend.

In the end, through player interaction, the anti-gov group got nabbed by the govt people who "black starred" people. The experimental tech was extracted from the other PC. And I got away with video of the "black star" people.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sun 6pm (6 hrs)

When did that prop get tentacles?
System: Call of Cthulhu, 7th Ed.
GM: Alicia Hansen
Players: 6 (full table with Cro M, Morgan Hua)

It's 1992. You’ve been working at GYRO's World of Terror for a few years now and everyone knows the stories of the “ghostly whispers” at one end of the mall. But the new stories of the weird stuff happening in the creature shop are intriguing. And when someone claimed one of the fake bodies was replaced with a real one last night you laughed it off. But Alix hasn’t shown up tonight and she has never missed a shift. After all, she wouldn’t want anyone to dethrone her as Chainsaw Queen.

GM's note: This haunt really existed and so did the characters and the rumors it was actually haunted.

This is Alicia's first time GMing a convention game and also with a game she designed. She did an amazing job.

Alicia had actually worked at GYRO's World of Terror, so we were getting an insider's view of that world. She took stories and rumors from her work to build out this game.

The infamous bad player also crashed this game. Luckily, for some unknown reason, he decided to sideline himself throughout the whole game, hiding out in safety and doing mostly nothing.

A good solid game with interesting surprises - and not derailed by a bad player.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

Alicia had interesting PCs with interesting powers. There was a Vampire, a Werewolf, a Chainsaw Maniac, a goth victim/screamer, a set of construction people (played by one player), and a triplet of security (played by one player).

I played "Chainsaw" Mike.

The scenario was interesting and kept us guessing. It started off with my missing screamer and built up to world ending Cthulhu-esque stakes. In the end, we saved the world.

One of my favorite bits was an Alien Egg: a player who'd never seen the movie didn't want to look closer, but a player who had seen the movie had to look closer with a Spot Hidden check. So very contrary, but funny.

Interesting facts about GYRO:

There's bragging rights to runners, screamers, punchers, etc. They keep track of how many people they scare or get to run away. So far, no pissers.

People who run the fright rooms, build the rooms. So, Chainsaw Mike is in charge of developing and building his room with support from the construction people and the creature shop.

The rule is you cannot touch customers and they cannot touch you. If they do, you call security. Security is generally near high risk places. Such as near where Chainsaw Mike's victim is; she is tied down and some creepy customers like to touch her.

The location is in an abandoned, but rented out mall. They rent it out for several months as they build out their rooms.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Mon 11am (6 hrs)

Criminal Gaiety
System: Call of Cthulhu, 5th Ed.
GM: dan pradanamus
Players: 6 (4 players: Chris F, Henry P, Morgan ?, Morgan Hua)

They were warned last year to stop. Once again it appears that revelry is in progress. 

It seems like when the weather gets good the problems start. Meanwhile, your family's been hungry for months.

OMG, here's a horrible game rescued by good players. When I showed up, the GM said, "I had hoped no one would show up." It was soon clear that the GM was only running this game to get a free badge.

He had no characters prepared. So, we spent 1/2 hour generating characters.

The game lasted 1-1/2 hours. It was supposed to be a 6 hr game.

The setting was 1628 Plymouth. We were sent to Merrymouth, our neighboring trading post to shutdown their May celebrations. They were in good with the natives, were prosperous, noisy, and not good Christians.

We soon realized that we 4 PCs (a leader of a prominent family - a face character, a butcher, a tracker, and a print shop worker)  probably had done something wrong and we were being sent on a suicide mission.

I was the face character and I asked if we had any native support. The response was "You've pissed them off, they don't like you."

When we arrived at Merrymouth, we saw people in various stages of undress dancing around a maypole, intermixed with natives, drummers, and people cavorting and having an orgy in the open. A den of sin. We lost SAN.

I rode up to the drummers, lined them up, and opened fire with my blunderbuss, taking all three of them out in one shot. What? Did you think I was going to talk to them? We gained SAN for killing them. 👿 I then called out for their town leader: "Thomas Morton! We are here to speak with you!" He never showed up. I reloaded as I kept on trying to goad him to show up.

We basically murder-hoboed Merrymouth.

In the end, the last to die were a threesome: Two Deep Ones shagging a human female in a hay cart. I blunderbusted them; only the woman died. My compatriots killed one Deep One, and I rode down the other one as it tried to escape.

We also set fire to the town and rescued all the abandoned goods from the trading post.

Before we left, I carved a message on a burnt shingle and attached it to the burned down maypole:

Thomas Morton
Thou hast been cast out

What saved the game? The players. We were making jokes throughout the game, about cannibalism, righteous fury, and inappropriate verses from the Bible. We were laughing as we burned down houses and bludgeoned people to death. We were horrible people. 👿