Morgan's DundraCon 2026 Excellent Adventures

I got to play 7 games and I ran one game. So, this was a pretty full schedule. Though, I only got into 4 games via the Shuffler. I crashed into two games and joined a game of Blood on the Clocktower. It was pretty crazy that the Shuffler gave me ZERO games for Saturday.

I had a great table for the game I ran. I enjoyed most of the games I played in. The highlight was experiencing Steven Drouin's Bibliomancy.

I had fun in all the games, even though I complain about somethings, they're minor compared to the pleasure I experienced, so overall, I had Excellent Adventures.

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Fri 2/13, Noon-6pm (took 5:15 hrs).

A-Paw-Calypse Meow

System: Year Zero Engine

GM: Morgan Hua

5 Players: Emily W (Bryd), Joshua L (KFC), Chris E (Tinkerbell), Gil T (Wild Thang), Nichole W (Snoop Cat)

Level: Pets of Rich and Famous People, Animals can talk to each other.

Pregens provided.

You play Jackie Chan's Squirrel, Samuel Jackson's Parrot, Snoop Dogg's Cat, Paris Hilton's Chihuahua, and Gary Busey's Dog. Your human is at some charity event and they abandon you at the hospitality suite. As the world spirals into collapse, you must work together to survive and travel to your wormiest hea>rt of darkness.

Tone: Darkly Humorous (Dale & Tucker vs Evil, Evil Dead 2, Shaun of the Dead, Animal Farm)

Content Tags: Horror Tropes, Apocalyptic, Cannibalism, Harm to Animals, Drug Use (light), Political Satire (definite), Fowl Language (possibly)

I had a great table. Out of all the times I've run this, this table laughed the most throughout the full 5 hrs. Chris killed it as Tinkerbell with the funniest version; a spoiled dog that only ate gourmet food and asked others to do things for it.

I also think this was my best run. At KublaCon, I forgot some stuff; and this time, I remembered some little bits and flourishes and put them in at the right time.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

This time, I changed how Byrd selected his 5 English phrases. They're not set, but once used, it's locked in. This worked a lot better. Emily decided to challenge herself by using iconic movie dialog from Samuel Jackson's movies. At the very end, she got in 5 of them. Personal challenge complete.

PCs set the National Zoo's gift shop on fire with RFK Jr's body in it.

KFC's archnemesis was Dobbie the Golden Retriever. This is the first time, the PC didn't use the Signature Attack on his archnemesis. I also moved the archnemesis to the National Zoo. When KFC checked out the taxidermized Kung Fu Panda, Dobbie steps out to face KFC. Once KFC knocked Dobbie to one die, he told him he had lost and to leave. Dobbie does. This was pretty cool.

In the end, the PCs rescued all their humans and left the White House.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Fri 2/13, 6pm-Midnight (took 6 hrs)

Lancer: The Kerberos Campaign

System: Lancer

GM: Keegan Pincombe

5 Players (+1 extra crasher): Roberto G (Peasant), Corbin F (Mariner), Ian (Cornora), Na S (Vahalla), Greg B (Playwright), Morgan Hua (Fullmoon - Gremlin).

Power Level: LL3

Pregens Provided.

When Union sent you to the resource-rich Kerberos system, it was as a security escort for the diplomats and mediators aboard the frigate UNS-LS Sacramento. You were there to show the flag, act as impartial observers, and deliver much-needed relief supplies as three warring nations made the first tentative overtures towards global peace.

Forty-eight hours ago, that plan went up in a blaze of nuclear fire.

Crash-landed and cut off, your squad must now make a daring insertion into hostile territory to rescue a priceless asset: Stacy, the Sacramento's command-and-control NHP. Within her armored escape casket are Schedule 1 matter printers, long range omnihook transceivers, reserve coldcore fusion batteries...everything you need to resupply and call for help.

This is not your world. This is not your war. It seems you'll be fighting anyway.

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Lancer is a hex-grid tactical combat game set against the rich tapestry of the interstellar human Diaspora in the far-flung future of 5016u. You are a mech pilot of exceptional skill (or exceptional luck), piloting a bespoke war machine of your own design into conflicts large and small. Rules-light narrative play supplements a flexible combat engine that encourages teamwork, tactical gameplay, and player customization.

I knew nothing about Lancer except it had good reviews. We had a great GM as this game is very, very crunchy, but the GM ran it smoothly. First 30 mins was roleplaying where we tried to find our NHP. The last 5.5 hrs was spent on one battle, so this game was basically a tactical combat game (full hex battlemat) with mechs.

I enjoyed this, but I won't play this again.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

The game started with us crashed on a moon. We look for survivors and get a signal from our NHP which was still re-entering the atmosphere and sending a distress call. We contact it and tell it to stop broadcasting the distress call and to give us it's telemetry. Once that was done, we hoof it towards it's crash site. On the way, we run into a small town, get directions and get to the crash site. This was the 30 mins of roleplaying.

Because we found the crash site quickly (one day travel without stopping), we got the benefit of deciding whether we setup an ambush or a defense perimeter around the NHP. If we had gotten there late, we would have to fight the enemy already there. We picked ambush. If we control the NHP's location at the end of round 6, we win. If not, we lose. In the middle of combat, the GM sent the second wave of enemy mechs (reinforcements).

We won on round 6.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sat 2/14, Noon-8pm (took 8 hrs)

All for One, and Ia Ia Cthulhu Fthagn!

System: Call of Cthulhu 7e

GM: Darin Owen

5 Players (+3): Jack Y (Felix Beaumont), Mike (Etienne Pelletier), Justin G (Louis St Martin), Wally S (Olivier Donnadieu), Sean P (Armand Charpentier), Rubin (Gilbert Marchand), Morgan Hua (Isabeau Girard), Drunk Dude (Claude Brienne).

Pregens provided.

Game Content: Mature Themes

As former Musketeers, you protected the body of Louis XIII. As members of The Ordre de la Fleur de Lys Noir, you protect France from her enemies both human, and eldritch. Gather all for a swashbuckling adventure of treasonous plots, arcane malfeasance, daring escapades, and confrontation with the Grand High Priest of France himself, Cardinal Richelieu.

I didn't get into any games on Saturday. So, I tried to crash into this one. The bad news was it was set for 5 Players and I saw 8 seats. GM told me there were 3 extra seats and one was mine if there was a no show. So that was the good news. Also Jack was playing, so that was good news too.

Here's the very bad news. The GM has 3 extra seats because his buddies sign up for his game and if they don't get into it officially, he lets them take an extra seat.

I got one of the empty seats. This left one empty seat.

GM spots a buddy and asks him to take the last seat. Buddy says he has errands to run. GM insisted. Buddy said he would be back later. We started the game and he finally shows up and starts drinking. He was a noisy drunk and wasn't paying attention to the game. Throughout the game, he was making jokes and talking over everyone. GM tried to quiet him multiple times, but with varying effect. It was very disruptive.

GM insisted we sit in initiative order. My seat was next to the drunk. He didn't sit in his seat, but sat on top of the table behind me. Because there were so many chairs around the table, my seat was also the seat that was up against that table and everybody needed me to move before they can get out of the room, or get a drink, or go to the bathroom. It sucked.

In the last two hours of the game, the drunk started coughing continuously (sometimes on me). And the GM and his buddies brought out various bottles of alcohol and started drinking. (If he was deliberately coughing, that's an asshole move, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.)

I concluded the drunk buddy didn't really want to play and was actively aggressively trying to disrupt the game. In the final fight, we were all stealthing and the drunk charged into the room, doing a Leeroy Jenkins. Earlier in the game, a Player animated one of the dead enemy, so he could question it. When the dead rose, drunk buddy said, "You mean it just got up? I kill it!" You should have seen the look of shock around the table.

I spoke to Jack afterwards and we came up with some minor criticisms:

Some of the handouts were way more than needed as the handouts gave us clues to the next scene. They actually became more like the glue between scenes vs a clue needed to figure out what was going on. The GM didn't really ask us where we were going, but told us where we were going. The excuse was the handout.

The GM liked to reinterpret our actions to make it more cinematic. Interesting and good, as an example of pulp action to those who lack imagination, but I thought it was ok at the start, but at some point, let the Players act the way they wanted to.

There was one scene we thought was totally unnecessary. It could have been merged into the finale. This would have shortened the game from 8 to 6 hrs.

I also noticed sometimes the GM didn't answer a direct question from me, I was met with silence, and he moved on to something else which was odd and later, during the game, that question got resolved.

I think the main sin is those 3 extra seats. Here I am complaining and I benefited from it.

As a GM, the GM is pretty good and the scenario was good too.

I had fun, but I'll probably make sure not so sign up for this GM's games due to the head count and drinking.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

I had to crash this game, so, I picked the second to last PC, the only female PC because the GM said she was necessary for the game and no one else picked her.

We're given a mission to retrieve a book.

The game started with a chase scene. My PC is kidnapped and in a carriage. Ahead and behind the carriage are guardsmen on horses, 6 in front, 6 in the rear. The coach has a driver and guardsmen on top, one with a blunderbuss. The carriage is racing along a road. On one side is a drop off into the sea and the other a cliff face rising upwards. This made an exciting chase and fight scene.

Inside the carriage was a chest. The bad guys (one who I recognize) finally open it. Inside, a crystal on a necklace, a large metal gear (manhole sized), and the book (giant tome). In the end, I saved the book. The PCs took out all the guards. The carriage went into the sea with a major bad guy with the crystal and the gear. During the fight, as each guardsman died, a red ball of light flew into the necklace.

We take turn in the book to our patron who translates it (massive handout). Are told to go to a Nunnery. Inside the catacombs, we find a massive gear (different from the one in the carriage). Once we take it, the dead rise to attack us. At some point, the dead tell us if we give it up (all in unison), it would spare the nuns and us. We refused to do so, eventually, enough undead attack us that we had to give it up. (GM tells us we're even being attacked by dead buried cows and peasants, not just the dead buried in the catacombs, we were being attacked by all the dead in all of France.) This felt like GM forcing the plot. I did tell Jack I did like the catacombs, it was a cool set piece. Jack countered that the catacombs could have been merged into the finale instead. So, we don't have the GM forcing us here. I agreed. The guy who summoned all the undead is a necromancer in a mask. With him is another man who one of the PCs recognized as the brother of the man in the carriage.

Once we gave up the gear by telling the undead we would, a PC uses a spell the hurl to it way from us smashing many of the undead. The hordes of undead surge to it and takes it away.

The next scene, we meet Cardinal Richelieu outside of a siege. We get sent to infiltrate the city to reach a ruined cathedral. Once inside, we go through tunnels to the finale. This is where Jack said the tunnels should have been replaced with the catacombs. In the tunnels we kill guardsmen, free some prisoners that were going to be sacrificed (sent them with weapons to free other prisoners), faced a Shoggoth (PC binds it and sent it back towards the big bad, so we follow it). In the main chamber, we face 3 major bad guys. This was actually neat. Generally, you get only one main bad guy. Later, we realize, it's one Major bad guy in a mask, and his two lieutenants, the two brothers. But all three of them were pretty powerful.

In the main chamber are prisoners to be sacrificed, a giant crystal, the two gears placed in their proper slots and souls flying to the small crystal fragment the man in the mask was holding. There are also various guardsmen.

PCs sneak in to attack various targets. The Shoggoth, now ordered to remove one of the gears and to protect it, enters and some PCs use it as cover. 

This is when Claude, alone, charges in with a frontal assault against the necromancer in the mask. Luckily, the prisoners we had rescued, arrive, charging in behind Claude. As if we planned it this way.

The necromancer unsummons the Shoggoth.

During the fight, the ground splits as the ritual of the necromancer is being completed, tentacles come out of the rift.

I'm freeing prisoners. 

One PC shoots the necromancer's hand, destroying it and sends the crystal flying. The necromancer reforms his hand. I want to put the crystal into my pistol and shoot the necromancer with it, so I ask how small was it and whether it would fit into the barrel of my gun, if so, I'd try to get to it, take out the lead ball and shoot the crystal instead. GM said it wouldn't fit. Another Player says the blunderbuss would take anything. Luckily, one of the PCs had asked for one.

A PC puts a chisel into the spot, on the large crystal, where the small fragment of crystal came from, and uses a spell to pound the chisel to shatter it. It explodes and we all take 44 pts of damage. Luckily we have Flesh Wards (21 pts) and Heavy Cloth (3 pts), and Cardinal Richelieu's blessing (+10 HPs). All of us survive. But so do the bad guys, but they're very hurt.

PCs kill the two lieutenants, but the necromancer is still standing. Everyone dog piles attacks on him to buy time as one of the PCs loads a blunderbuss with crystal shards. The blunderbuss kills him. The rift closes. A tentacle comes out of a crystal shard and pulls the remains of the necromancer into oblivion.

This final fight was pretty cool.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sun 2/14, 8pm-Midnight (took 4 hrs)

Blood on the Clocktower

This is actually a social deduction game. More or less a LARP. I was about to go home, but got invited to play and wanted to try this out. I thought it would take 1/2 an hour, but setup was about 1/2 an hour. I was the Fortune Teller. After the first round of accusations, there were two Players who I suspected were bad guys. I was going to use my ability on them, but I got murdered.

This game went on a lot longer that I wanted. There were times where people kept on negating previous votes and then lots of repeats of previous arguments.

In the end with 4 Players left, another Player got fed up and randomly chose someone to execute and that ended the game, the bad guys won because they supported the execution. What was sad, was if they talked it out a bit and accused the right person, the villagers would have won.

Once the solution was revealed, my initial hunch was correct. What was interesting, was the longer the game went, the more doubt crept into my head.

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Sun 2/15, 8am-Noon (took 4 hrs)

Games without Frontiers

System: Alien 1e

GM: Dave Sokolowski

5 Players: Dave B (PFC Albert Lee - comtech), Corey C (LCpl Dani Boor - medic), Geoff G (Lt Rebecca Jimenez - CRN), Jerry C (Casey Bolton - Company Man), Morgan Hua (Sgt Tyler McIntosh - Assault Rifleman). 

Pregens provided.

Game Content: Mature Themes

Outer Veil - Two weeks ago, a Weyland-Yutani team arrived at the classified We-Yu Research Facility Crest-Magma 231.a to retrieve goods. Shortly thereafter, the base went dark, and all team communications ceased. Your quickly assembled section of Marines and Company Representatives has been sent to investigate the communications outage, reclaim control of the base, and ensure the safety of any lost scientific data and research materials.

Website: http://keeperdave.itch.io/games-without-frontiers

I had fun, but the scenario is a bit railroady as there's only one path (ok for a short 4 hr convention game). In the end, only my PC died, everyone else made it out alive, well maybe, the Medic got infected and won't live.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

We stealth to the research facility, a space station that's dark. It's locked down. It has 2 docking ports. On one end, is a WY high-end freighter; a UPP assault ship on the other. We break into the UPP ship and find the pilot is dead and it has tried to send a message. We decrypt the message and it's a video explaining that they were wiped out by violent synthetics and there's something else onboard the station. We stop the broadcast and delete the message.

Inside the station is signs of violence. Also a yellow crystal is growing along the corridors.

We go to the other docking port. There's a damaged synthetic, a David in the pilot seat. On a white board is the message "Don't Trust." It sees us, makes sure we see the message and it erases it. It tells us about the UPP assault and that two other Davids are trying to access the lab which is locked down. Company Man shoots the David in the head at point blank.

PCs go to the bridge and see two Davids working on the electronics. Company Man talks to them, both Davids act in unison, after we get info, Company Man tries to draw his pistol, but the Davids attack us. We take out the Davids.

The only way to get the research data is to get to repair damaged equipment in the bridge and access MUTHER. We repair the damage. The only way to MUTHER is through the lab. More yellow crystals coat everything leading to the lab. The lead scientist asks us to unlock the door. We do. Talk to her. Then she transforms into something monstrous.

My PC does major shock damage to the creature. In response, she smashes and kills my PC. The other PCs kill her. Company Man goes to MUTHER, gets the lab data, and sets a self-destruct. PCs escape on the luxury freighter.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sun 2/15, 2pm-8pm (took 4 hrs)

What the Sea Taketh, the Sea Keepeth

System: Obscure RPG

GM: Sean Phelan

5 Players (2 no shows): Morgan Hua (Eddie Foster - Olympian swimmer wannabee), Glen H, Patrick A, Thomas C (not sure who the no show was). One PC was Hernandez -- our Medic who wants to be in medical school; Other was our Leader, from a long line of navel men.

Pregens provided.

Game Content: Mature Themes

You're members of the U.S. Coast Guard's Aviation Rescue Swimmers (ASTs), investigating the mysterious disappearance of the cruise ship, Splendid Sojourn. Communication was lost as it sailed from Florida to Barbados — and was never heard from again...until now.

Obscure is the Found Footage Inspired Horror RPG.

Website is to Obscure's completed Kickstarter, which has information on game.

Website: www.kickstarter.com/projects/sunze/obscure

I thought this game was a full multi-media event with video, audio, and pictures. I was wrong. It was more or less a standard RPG. The seed for the scenario is found footage, but we didn't see it, it was described to us like in all other RPGs.

Since we only had 3 Players, the game ended early. The issue is with less than the full compliment, the finale was a lot tougher. The game system is very unforgiving as Anxiety Points mount up and there's no way to succeed when that happens. I basically don't think this system works.

Each Anxiety Point = 1d6, if any of the Anxiety dice rolls a 1, you panic. Near the end of the scenario, I had 6 Anxiety Pts. The chances of not rolling a 1 was very low. 

The game is a bit railroady (which is ok for a convention game, but lacks complexity).

I enjoyed the creepiness of the game and had fun. I don't recommend the system.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

PCs get dropped into the water to investigate a sunk ship. Every room we explore is full of very, very creepy stuff. We take pictures and try to inventory the dead and try to find the manifest for the ship. The problem is once we went through a big part of the ship, our Anxiety Point count was so high, we stopped looking in every room because we knew we'd increase our Anxiety and just flee (fleeing does not decrease your Anxiety). Also because we looked in the mirror image of those rooms and they were just passenger rooms.

In the end, with 3 PCs, our leader (with the least Anxiety) decided to join the evil, and dropped his speargun. So, it was left to me and the medic to try to kill the evil. The medic went to pick up the dropped speargun, our leader tried to stop him, I tried to intercept our leader. Medic actually made his die roll (even with 6 or 7 Anxiety pts). I panicked. GM ruled that in my panic, I get in the way of the Medic's shot and I get shot with the speargun. This actually takes me down to 1 HP. So we flee the evil looking for something else to destroy the ship or interrupt the ritual. We find possible things to do (pools of oil and fuel), but we didn't have the equipment to ignite it.

What I didn't like was early in the game I asked for underwater flares. I was told we didn't get them. After the game, we found out that inside the ONE door we didn't open, was a supply closet with underwater flares, air canisters, and lots of other stuff we could have used. WTF?

With our Leader volunteering, the ritual was complete and the darkness engulfed us and the entire world. THE END.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Sun 2/15, 6pm-Midnight (took 6 hrs)

Bibliomancy

System: Bibliomancy

GM: Steven Drouin

5 Players: Morgan Hua, Z Morgan, K Reichhold, M Durkee, J Means, N Geier. (there was one no show, so I took their seat. I'm not sure who the no show is).

Characters created at game.

Libraries across the globe are under attack. Books are disappearing in puffs of purple-green mist. You are a book, violently brought to life, and bound to defend the written word. Learn to draw power from within yourself and unravel the mystery of these coordinated assaults.

Bibliomancy is a new mystery/horror TTRPG that uses player brought books as the characters for the session. Books should be approximately 200 pages in length. You will be destroy your book as part of gameplay. GM will bring extra books just in case.

This was the standout game for me.

A very cool game mechanic. You definitely need to love books, words, and libraries. If you don't, this game probably isn't for you. In our game, one of the Player's real life job is Librarian. So is Steven's.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

We first have to pick a book to be our character. The Librarian brought her own. I immediately took The Mammoth Book of Slasher Movies.

We're summoned by another book, a Summoner, told that libraries are under attack, and we're taught two ways (out of 4) to fight:

• LitText (non-fiction book filled with text): Tear out a page from your book and to circle words to make a spell which manifests physically to attack.
• FigText (fiction book filled with text): Tear out a page from your book and circle letters to spell out words which manifests physically to attack.

The spells do damage. If the target book matches our attack method (LitText vs LitText), damage is doubled. If we rip out two more pages, the damage is doubled again. Books HPs are = number of pages, thicker books have more HPs. NPC books just have blocks of HPs, we don't have to physically tear apart a real NPC book, but just a NPC sheet which has the book cover and inside, a sample of it's contents.

Right after we learn our two spells, books (with bookmarks) show up and attack our Summoner, killing it. They also attack two other books. 

We guess as to whether our enemy books are LitText or FigText by their covers (yes, judging books by their covers 😀).

After defeating our foes, torn book marks fall to the ground. We examine them and they contain instructions. It looks like they've been tasked to go to our library and another and to destroy a list of books. We find two of the books are present, but not the third.

At this time we create our characters. We tear another page out of our book and circle words to create our character sheet: My name: Low Budget. Appearance: Large Boobs. Demeaner: Unreserved. Drive: Killing Annoying Teenagers.

My PC: Low Budget

Back of Bookmark and my surviving pages, down to page 111.

The back of the bookmark also has some interesting spells. We realize the enemy books used Crossing to arrive at our library by putting the numbers 1592 on to PLACE HERE.

We learn we can ask books questions at the cost of 1 page. So we question the two books that survived as to their contents.

Then we go to the enemy second library goal by tearing numbers out of our pages, 1800, and placing them in the correct order in PLACE HERE. We arrive at the Library of Congress. Another Summoner greets us and asks if we want to pledge our Oath to the Ordo VVallum Libria. Three of us do. After pledging our oath, we gain one of three Oath Enrichments. I picked Popular, as I'm a Popular Low Budget book. 😀

Once there, enemy books arrive and books are attacked again. We fight back, but realize we've mis-judged some books by their covers and they're hardly damaged and we've lost a handful of pages to them. In the end we defeated them. They were visual books, and we learned how to attack them properly:

• LitVis (non-fiction book filled with illustrations): Tear out a page, and tear the paper into the shape of letters and spell a word or phrase. The spell manifests physically to attack.
• FigVis (fiction book filled with illustrations): Tear out a page, and tear the paper into the shape of an object. The spell manifests physically to attack.

How we choose our attacks are based on how the enemy manifested. Some show up as giant flaming fists or dark clouds. I believe Steven picked imagery based on words in the book's titles.

Again we get more enemy bookmarks pointing to our next location. Steven also showed us beautiful pictures of each library.

At the next library, we had to solve a puzzle to get into the hidden restricted section, using the library's statues and a poem. Underneath the flooring, we find chained up books.

Chained books

More enemy books show up, all had flowers in their title. This time, we decide to do an Appraisal. If we tear half of our back or front cover off, we can figure out what type of book they are. I actually get two free Appraisals because I was a Popular book. When you do an Appraisal, you can open up the book covers and read the text (or see the illustrations inside), then you can figure out what type of book it is.

At one point, I tried to figure out what type of books they were by the spells they used to attack us. I guessed wrong.

We defeat these books too. We question the books that were their target and start to understand what was going on. Books are like prayers, creating a cacophony of noise that the gods can't hear, but by destroying First Editions and their lineage, that noise is quieted. Then the True Voice can be heard. Someone wanted to manifest their vision as the truth. We also found the enemy books were infested with moths (and other book destroying insects).

Our last stop was the British Museum. The goal, the Necronomicon. Where new hidden pages were found through a non-invasive technology. The book is protected behind sturdy glass. The only way to get through is to do something Physically which required destroying one of our Bibliomantic Quadrans, one of our spell combat skills. One if the PCs does that and shatters the glass.

This is where I should say that when books fight books, it's more of a literary fight, a combat of ideas. So, we imagine the spells manifesting (metaphorically) and see the fight, books do get damaged, but to interact with real physical objects like glass, a table, or human, they must do it Physically.

We fight more books and a human where another PC had to sacrifice a Quadran. The books and person was feeding on the Necronomicon. A PC tried to question the book, but lost half his remaining pages. When a PC picked up the damaged book, costing another Quadran, moths fell out of it and a note, the hidden pages. It tells us that its goal is to contain the moths and we must either repair it or contain it.

I sacrifice a Quadran to draw a rectangle around the book, then we have to tear out a page and sacrifice a Truth (read out loud a truth from the page) for each side. We learned this spell from various books we talked to earlier. Once we succeeded, we won!

For our epilogue, we got to tear out a page from our book and circle phrases that describes what happens to us.

I became one of the replacement Summoners. You should never judge a book by it's cover. 😀

The book that was torn in half was a young juvenile book with few words, large text, illustrated, big margins. The Player probably had a challenge for his spells. I had an easy time as my book was full of violent words and commentary about various directors and movies, and dates, so I had an easy time of it. His denouement was brilliant, about fading into the void and being lost forever.

One Player had a large fantasy novel. Another a non-fiction book on archeological digs. Another a non-fiction book on ancient myths.

Overall, a very, very creative game.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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Mon 2/16, 10am-4pm (GM was sick, so we only played about 2 hrs)

Into the Forbidden Zone (Murder in Ape City)

System: Planet of the Apes (D6MV Magnetic Variant)

GM: Norm Albert

6 Players: Sam S (Perdita - Mutant), Tom M (Thomson - Astronaut), Tom M (Maguhilo - Orananutan), Alex Z (Twitch - Mute Human), Paul M (Dr Sabastiano - Chimpanze), Morgan Hua (Sergent Ulmar - Gorilla).

Pregens provided.

The unthinkable has happened! Ape has killed ape! Join the investigation and help restore peace and order to Ape City.

GM told us his earlier run of Murder in Ape City didn't work, so he decided to run Into the Forbidden Zone which is a published scenario. We played for about an hour, then GM was sick, fighting nausea and disorientation. We took a 1/2 hr break. Started again and it was clear the GM wasn't doing very well. We discussed ending the game, but he said he felt bad about letting us down. Someone suggested a break for an hour, GM went to sleep. We left. An hour later, we returned to the room and to my surprise everyone was there. We played another 1/2 hr and the GM finally said, he couldn't go any longer and called it.

Things I liked about Planet of the Apes system: We had a variety of Apes (Gorillas, Chimpanzees, and Orangutans) and Humans (Mutants, Natives, Astronauts). Art is very consistent and evocative. The society gives the PCs lots of things to have conflict about; During play, we had a lot of misunderstandings, snide comments about other races, jokey comments (references to the movies).

Things I didn't like: The dice system. On most tasks, we failed a lot unless we used our Hero Points, then we succeeded by a wide margin. Either we barely hit and did nothing, or we hit very well and wounded our opponents. At one point, someone shot a Gorilla successfully and nothing happened (Ok, I looked at the rules, the Gorilla should have been Stunned for 1 round), so chalk this up to GM error. System used a d6 dice pool, summing all the numbers up. One die is replaced with a special Wild Die which can explode on a 6 (continue rolling until a non-6 is rolled, all numbers rolled are added to the total). When you spend a Hero Point, you double the number of dice rolled. And if your total is double your Difficulty Number (DN), you do double damage. 

At first we thought the Hero Points were very limited, but we asked how to recover them and GM didn't know. Someone looked it up, if you roll a 6 on the Wild Die, you gain at least 1 Hero Point. So, they're a lot more common than we thought. I looked at the rules and if a 1 is rolled on the Wild Die, GM can introduce Setbacks (for free) or adjust the success and award Hero Points.

GM didn't have a good grasp of the system, but it was probably due to his disorientation, so we spent a lot of time waiting as he looked up rules. It also didn't help Players would ask questions and derail the GM as he's still trying to figure out earlier stuff, almost like throwing more plates at a juggler who was in the middle of dropping 1 or 2 plates.

The GM getting sick isn't his fault. He also had some neurological problems, I noticed hand tremors and weakness in his hand. Later, I remembered another game that he had run, and he had the same problems with the rules, but this time it was a lot worse.

My goal of checking out Planet of the Apes was fulfilled. I may try this system again, but with a different GM.

=== SPOILER SECTION START ===

PCs are in an Ape prison. We learned things about each other, escaped, found our stuff, and the game ended. This was more or less an open sandbox for the PCs. Once they escape, they can go anywhere since the PC group had apes, humans, a mutant, and an astronaut. Our plan, after escaping, was to go into the underground tunnels Twitch knew about, get supplies, and escape into the Forbidden Zone (Perdita's home).

After putting some plans into action to escape, an earthquake happened that aided our escape. I actually didn't like this as it was very Deus Ex Machina. I believe it was part of the scenario and not a way for the GM to hurry us along.

=== SPOILER SECTION END ===

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