This was my fourteenth AmberCon NorthWest (ACNW).
GM John Kim
Thursday - 7pm to midnight
This was the sixth year of this game - my only continuing campaign game thus far. It is a re-imagining of Zelazny's Amber around a Chinese theme, where all civilizations and universes are merely reflections of the great Jade Empire, and the Pattern is housed deep in the Forbidden City within the capital. There are many relatives since the first emperor long ago, and those in whom the imperial blood runs true are superhuman - able not only to walk the Pattern, but to leap to the tops of buildings and engage in fantastical swordplay. It merges Amber with the Chinese wuxia genre. My players and their characters were:
Important NPCs included:
The game started when Hin-Hung lead an occupying army over a provincial village near the homes of Huang and Lixue. Both of them were part of a new reality, and no longer recognized the Jade Throne. An hours-long fight between Huang and Hin-Hung devastated the village, ending in a stalemate where Hin-Hung went back to discuss events. The rest of the session covered:
The game ended with the promise that Lady Wang's insurrection was quelled, though she herself remained free.
GMs Amanda Carpenter and John Hostetter
Friday - 9am to 1pm
This was a larp with 8 players about a cluster of ships in a decaying orbit around Jupiter. It had an in-depth layout of many rooms with borders marked out in tape, with a mechanic of EVA suits that we would use to go between ships.
The plot involved a number of twists, but the core was that only a subset of characters would be able to escape, and we had to work together to some degree to escape. However, as players we managed to get a perfect score, with zero characters escaping.
I ended up making a set of numbered chits for others to draw from, so for a while we had a tentative agreement that those who drew the low numbers would be the ones to escape. Steele, armed with an assault rifle, supported and enforced this - taking the #1 chit for herself, but then giving it to the Dr. Gonzales.
However, strangely, there was conflict among those who were escaping, who threatened one of them - resulting in violence shortly before we had to leave. When Steele tried to storm in, I swiped at her to dissuade violence, but I failed and was then shot. After that, Steele was killed and there were three survivors escaping. However, the two in the pod betrayed the engineer. After hearing this, Franks who had stayed behind to control the engines decided to ditch both ships into the planet.
I had some problems with the background and setup of the larp, as well as the choices that lead to the initial fight. But the ending where we all died was quite satisfying, so we had fun.
GM Eleanor Todd
Friday - 2pm to 6:30pm
This was the second episode of a continuing game of a science-fiction re-skinning of Amber, centered on modern-day Earth where a strange family are dealing with consequences of their quantum connections to the rest of the world. The two established players were playing empowered members of the Marchand family - relatives of NPCs Catherine Marchand and her brother Henry.
The new players, on the other hand, were playing random people from anywhere in the world. They were:
There were also two older NPCs -- the family matriarch Catherine Marchand and her brother Henry. The game action roughly broke into two parts -- the first two-thirds dealing with the four newcomers being introduced and adjusting, and the last third with an assault on reality.
Each of the newcomers disappeared from their normal lives across the globe, and appeared inside a specially-equipped chamber in the basement of a fancy home in Palo Alto, California. We slowly found that not only had we been bodily moved, but had been merged in some way with a member of the family. Dr. Mutsuray and Paisa with Dominique - a mathematician and champion skier; Augusta-Flores with Bernard; and Dr. Divine with Amleen Westing. We were introduced to the family and given a place to stay, and argued over what we should be doing. Paisa and Mutsuray were most inclined to go back to their normal lives, with Paisa resisting any exploration of their alternate identity. Each of the four started with gaining English fluency, as well as other skills and memories. Further, there were powers. Dominique evidently had a talent for teleportation, and Amleen for telepathy.
The four stayed overnight and started to plan for how to deal, when reality started to collapse in on them -- with the world outside fading to black. Everyone rushed back into the machine in the basement, which when activated protected them. Using their new powers and connections, Yan reached out and pulled in his girlfriend (?) with Dr. Mutsuray's help, and she then demanded help in pulling in her five-year old son. The others then confronted the source of the attack, and ? returned to the chamber with the unconscious body of a man who was orchestrating it. Dr. Mutsuray was emotional and moved to act on the suggestion to kill him, but instead took her son out of chamber.
GM John Kim
Friday - 8pm to midnight
This was a run of Bluebeard's Bride. I had been apprehensive of this game, after having a bad experience running the game at Big Bad Con, but this game was much more successful.
GM John Kim
Saturday - 9am to 4:30pm
This was a diceless game set in the 1980s, where the player characters were all top scientists who come to a small town to deal with strange events.
I had each player describe some bits from their introductory scene - starting with Jenna helping the crazed General Patterson, and then calling each of the scientists in. I also had them each add some details into the four kids who were in the town. They were brought into Sundance, Wyoming, where three people had been put into a coma by tiny poison darts with an unknown biological toxin. They investigated and set up base with a dozen soldiers, taking over a lodge on the edge of town.
What followed was great in how the players genuinely were trying to go in and solve the mystery as their characters. Classic bits of note included:
GM David Young
Saturday - 7pm to midnight
This was a run of a scenario for the Kids on Bikes system. I played the Popular Kid archetype -- created as Terry Charles, a theater kid and son of the school principal. His Motivation was "Being a Superstar", fear was "Being Alone", and Flaws were "Self-Centered" and "Vain". So I was kind of one-note. He had a bunch of hair care products and accessories in his backpack. The other PCs were:
We started I think at the arcade, but heard that something had killed a classmate Sandy's dog. My contribution there was to comfort poor sad Sandy, by which I meant macking on her - which she welcomed, it turned out. Meanwhile, the others checked on the evidence.
We then went into the woods and found a wounded elven archer (!), and brought her back to Lily's garage, I think. From her drawings and Starling's Dungeons & Dragons books, we discovered we were dealing with with a manticore. We then concocted a traditional wacky plan to lure it into the school gym, lock it in, and then shoot it with her bow.
Overall, I was disappointed with the Kids on Bikes system, even though it was a fun set of players and scenario.
GM Keith Baker
Sunday - 10am to 4:30pm
This was the second of a continuing diceless game set in the D&D setting of Eberron, created by the GM Keith.
This was a Western-themed game set in Eberron. I played a total bastard - a Cyran officer who disappeared for a time after the devastating Last War, and showed up with unexplained new skill in wand-slinging and enough money to buy his own saloon. His was a sketchy slum of a joint called The Leering Goblin - mocking the goblin owner Grin of the respectable establishment in town. He was racist against goblins, while involved in all sorts of criminal enterprises himself - prostitution, dreamlily, and gambling. As old friends with the Sheriff, he had convinced him that people really wanted these outlets.
This session involved dealing with a group of three mercenaries from a dragon-blooded house, who had come into town on the trail of the dawn shard that we had turned up last session. Tiburcio naturally invited them into his own establishment. The plot focused on keeping the House in the dark about the sources of powerful shards in the area, so they wouldn't move in and take over.
ACNW remains my favorite role-playing convention. The community is a big part of that, which is helped by the shared culture - and also by pre-convention organizing.