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Woo, what a weekend.
Let's go chronologically this time.
Friday night I got there later than I wanted after finishing up my public speaking class (almost none of which helped me prepare for LARPing
) and once again, had to wait until after Gameon and the meeting to check in. My fault for letting Taki and Phil go first, and any disrespect felt there was completely unintended, I was just letting some of Cirrus' irreverence get a bit too far off the chain. The actual check-in process was smooth as silk, even with the extra stuff I was not expecting. My dumb feathery butt was the biggest hindering factor. Props!
Jenny, Brad, Mike, and especially Doug, GREAT scene, probably my favorite of the weekend.
Ditto on Doug that the molemen and snakemen seem purposefully willing to subterfuge our words and truces to keep snapping at each other. I know it's something we need to fix, but I'd like to see reasons rather than loopholes prompting their attacks. Edited Lawton was a nice touch for later.
The "cave" battle Saturday morning was probably the biggest oxymoron of the weekend with the skyjuice dumping down furiously. Beyond that, the possession mechanic worked well, much better than the lurker plot at the May event. Well done! I feel like we missed something huge with the pixies.
The whole rest of the aspect with the Amulet of Control was a very interesting and convoluted plot, speaking well to the GMs again for keeping everything mostly straight. Hindsight really was 20/20 here, and it was great to have everything finally click before I got knocked out and bundled back to the Traveler. This was the textbook example of how to keep the whole town motivated and involved with minimal combat and player NPC effort.
That whole thread had some great moments, but I think there was way too much of a delay from when Mike announced that just about everyone from Group 2 of the Friday night battle was going to have something terrible happen to them. I don't know if this was a issue with getting things organized and allowing us to stew about it, or a last-second change after seeing just who would be affected by the Amulet, but it could have just as easily been announced at the appropriate time in the scene rather than segregating the PCs. Small change, but that was the only thing I was disappointed by with the scene.
Phil, again, well played sir. It should be a rule to include techno while under the influence of the Korrigan Special. I'll be working on the video unless Brett beats me to it. However, this was where the Scouts were at their worst. I poked my head up to listen to the far off noises of COMBAT!, but in reality, it was a chattering HORDE of people walking through our space without any thought. Maybe we could have included them in the respect speech at Gameon.
Game Break took a little while to chug back up the PC train, I felt bad for everyone looking for trouble while we were investigating Qualm and the squatters. I did see another plot going on simultaneously, which was another great use of PCs in NPC roles. The pasta was a great touch Mike.
Finally, the two big battles of the night. Jeremy and Daniel were great fighters (you better come back!), and I had a fun tumble when my dumb feathery butt forgot about Flee. However, I have to echo Brett with the "But wait, where's the rest of it?" I would have liked some narration about Corbyn's body exploderating, or the Dreaming suddenly and nastily intersecting with Phanterra, or some other way of very definitely announcing the end of the festivities. The Necropolis battle was similarly underwhelming. It definitely felt like "Oh, we need to get this in, so how can we do it quickly?" Jared's fleshgolemcasterthing was a great final boss, but I think that was where moar permanent NPCs was sorely needed. Sad.
If it hadn't rained, and there had been one or three more NPCs on staff, this would have easily been my favorite event evar. As it stands, it's definitely way up there. Booping skyjuice.
TL;DR -
MOAR NPCs. Using players is great, and props to everyone who volunteered, but I'm glad to see Daniel and Jeremy (COME BACK!) decide to throw their lot in with the overworked staff.
Mike, Brad, Mike, Jared, Christen - You guys win. I was wiped out even with sitting back for a while and letting everyone else do the work, but you all kept going for all of our little whims. Saying thank you is not appropriately strong enough.
PCs - Thanks for NPCing to make battles awesome, and staying in character to make the roleplaying better.
EEESHINYSTUFF
Bring on 2013!