Convergence DM Log - Session 1 - 10/27

Preamble

 As I sit down to write these words I'm still struck by the fact that so many people had so much faith in us as to support this game before it even officially launched.  It was so humbling to come to the table with my amazing players and know that we had people excited to see what we could produce and then hope no one left disappointed.

Aveline's Flashback

From a lore point of view I wanted to give the players and audience a sense of what it was like to be within a convergence event.  Given that Aveline was the most recent one to appear on Earth Prime, it seemed perfect to let Pond role play that out.  I had at first considered creating an overlay for just the two of us and then put the rest of the cast in a breakout room so that they didn't know exactly what Aveline's experience was like.  While very possible, from a stream point of view it seemed a bit pointless; any of the players could just watch live.  In addition, it would have forced exchanges that I wanted to gloss over, something I'll talk about later.

One of my favorite characters in Michael Sharra's book "Killer Angels" and in the film Gettysburg is the character of Harrison.  There is some account that such a man did exist and did "scout" for the Confederate Army prior to the battle of Gettysburg.  While I do not agree with his loyalties, I appreciate the character for what he was: a common man of no soldiering skill who felt a need to do what he could do with the talents he had for his side of the war.  I wanted to bring that character to life in the game.

I will confess that Aveline's challenge of "is all this a game to you, a story to tell?" took me a bit aback.  Often as DM you think you're taking a character and scene one way and then have to correct to bring it back when you get that feedback from the player(s).  

Then the Convergence event struck and I was really taken by the fact that Aveline turned back to try to rescue Fredrick and help him out-run the wave of energy represented by the event.  I knew when we reached that point in the story that he was going to come through the event with her but would disappear until later in our story.

In retrospect I feel that I didn't quite fully capture the event as it is hard to describe.  What I wanted the most to convey is the sense that it was relatively (physically) painless.  I also wanted to show that at the edge of the event there was a simple "pop" and suddenly the entire event was impressed upon Earth Prime.  From the view inside the event, it was impossible to know where it was all going until that final moment.

Jumping to the "Est Buy"

I love to let my players role play.  Usually.  There was the one time that the players set out to interrogate every single member of a Vistani caravan because they were convinced that it was impossible that the story of the curse was "simply never spoken of".  That all said, I didn't want to create a long scene of a town elder coming to the players and and begging them to help rescue the kids.  We all knew they'd take the mission and we all knew that the real action would be inside the emptied big box store.

In my mind I saw it much like I would see a film.  We had the 10 minute opening scene with Aveline going through the event and then walking down the hill towards the farm.  The camera would pan up, show the titles and then dissolve into boots walking into the store with the caption on the screen reading "3 weeks later".  I think the audience is more than able to fill in the gaps and figure out that Aveline found these other characters and had fallen in with them for whatever reason.

The map for the adventure was courtesy Alecmck on Fiverr (https://www.fiverr.com/alecmck).  I won't lie:  it was silly easy to message him, explain the story up to this point, and let him do his work.  It felt a bit like I was running a published adventure at this point.  All I had to do was create the encounters.

DM Talk - Spider Swarm

This fight was simple enough; I just used the stock "Swarm of Insects" from the basic rules and retitled it as "Swam of Spiders".  (https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/swarm-of-insects)  To be fair the swarm packs a lot of HP against a first level party (coming in at 22) but as you saw, between the cleric's armor it wasn't too rough on the party.

Deeper into the Depths of Capitalism

I still cannot believe that not one but twice we got to use the phrase "It's a free action to drop the gnome".  I really enjoyed the characters' banter as they explored and the ease with which the players accepted that they missed the giant spiders up in the rafters.  One of the biggest challenges I find at tables is that sweet spot between "I looked there!" and "But you didn't look exactly in the right place".  I love that this group rolls with things for the story and I'm happy to do the same.

DM Talk - Giant Spiders Attack

Again, nothing out of the ordinary here:  a basic rules Giant Spider (https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/giant-spider)  Two made a solid fight, in theory, but given the amount of damage doled out by Aveline's axe and Kati's warhammer, it made sense for the other spider to retreat.

Real Talk about NPC's

I am not good at advance writing all of the things.  The three kids being the reason for the party to explore the abandoned big box store came into the story very late in the planning and I simply never had time to come up with names for them.  Thank fully there's this little tool:  https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/

I don't recall exactly what list I went with but with a few clicks I had a list of 10 male names and 10 female names and I could pick and choose quickly to flesh out the story on the fly.

Wrapping the adventure

Keeping an eye to the clock I realized we weren't going to finish the final confrontation with the massive spider in the stock area.  But I wanted to give the party a chance to have some fun going in.  Originally they were going to open the back door to see the spider getting ready to nom on one of the kids.  I also knew that I had about 10 to 15 minutes of game time to play with.  That let me set the scene, let the party go in to investigate the kids, and do all the things before revealing the large final spider.  It made, I like to think, a nice end to the session.

My Stars and Wishes

Top stars for the night had to include Pond's role play with Fredrick and Aveline's devotion to her fight.  It made little sense, really, to take all of those resources in black powder just to blow up a wagon.  But it also revealed that Aveline wasn't in this just for the fight, she is the sort to make a statement.  I think that moment was incredibly telling.  The banter among the players would be my second star.

My personal wish was that I had invested more time into scripting, writing and rehearsing the final moments of the convergence event.  It was my one shot to do it (the players won't ride one again, excepting our possible role play of Kati's event) and I think I could have done better with more prep on that specifically.

Looking Ahead (POSSIBLE SPOILERS)

I am pretty sure that Fredrick the Actor is not dead.  It is quite likely he'll be performing under a new name of course.  He is a survivor by way of his acting and that's a trope/ character I want to explore some more.  Aveline's fiancé may or may not be lost but I can assure you that her status is going to be a major plot point going forward.  I feel a little dirty but from a game planning point it's kind of fun to know that all I need to do is dangle "I've heard of your world, I've heard there's more of your kind around here" and Aveline's going to be reaching for the nearest set of reigns.

I'm also starting to feel a little bad about what's in store for the 7-11 base the party has.  While I like the idea of them having a home base, so much of this story is going to require them to get up and move around, I find myself struggling with exactly how to get them on the road in a way that doesn't make anyone quit on me.  

I am, however, excited for what's coming in the future.  I've got another artist working on a larger dungeon map and I might try my hand at making one or two on my own.  Looking at future campaigns, I think I'll want to put more into the goals related to maps because they do take so much of a load off the planning.  Even just having the map done for me frees me up to just plan the encounters as the party presses into the darkness.

Reminders

We are off on 11/3 as I am going to be at Parent Teacher Conferences.  Our next game session is on 11/10 for Episode 2.  And I personally cannot wait.

Until then,

I remain, etc, etc,

Rob aka Lantern Noir

Watch the Episode on YouTube: