Obviously, the world didn't end in 2012. Big surprise there, huh?
The new V:tM LARP has been eating up a lot of my time. Its lead me to a very interesting realization; having a LARP once every two week does not give me more free time to play around with in between sessions. In point of fact, having to deal with events that take place at game along with the downtime actions submitted and figuring out where plots fall and/or intercept with player actions means that I have less time to play around with. Its an interesting conundrum, and one that has apparently lead people to believe that neither of the Storytellers is doing a whole lot between sessions. This was something I endeavored to correct before our last game session, along with letting people know that if they have problems with something that they need to come and talk to us, otherwise we can't do anything to fix it. Hopefully the message sticks.
As for the game itself, its progressing well. Its taken a lot of twists and turns, some of them unexpected but the story continues on. However, I doubt that it will reach the point my fellow Storyteller believes for the projected "end of chronicle", which was a year and a half from the start date. Honestly, I believe that when that time projections comes to an end, the story and players are still going to be going strong and want to continue on. This is something I'm completely fine with, but I have no idea how the other Storyteller will react it. I haven't shared this insight with him yet, mainly because I believe that he'll be resistant to the idea if it doesn't come from the players. What we presented them with when we started was a unique situation and I think the novelty of that is still fresh enough to keep a lot of the repetition and boredom experienced by the players at bay. Things have just now reached the point where they've established an actual Domain, which is a big deal in Vampire the Masquerade. We're still building a lot of forward momentum and we haven't even reached the apex of the proverbial hill yet; in my opinion we haven't even sighted it yet.
That brings me to another event though, one which is less pleasing. A few years back, during another Chronicle, there was a friend of mine who was a member of the Storytelling staff. At the time he was going through some rough patches, and it was effecting his efforts negatively, which lead to other members of Staff asking him to step down. I honestly believe that he never really got over it, and its been eating at him since. In each subsequent game where he's been a player (that I've witnessed) he's found one member of Staff to fixate on, and has been antagonistic and confrontational towards that person. While some of the accusations/arguments raised have proved valid, the majority of them aren't and I'm tired of putting out fires, as the saying goes. With just two Storytellers on staff for this game, its been particularly wearying and I need to talk to him about it. Whether or not my theory proves true, it still needs to come to a stop; we've never claimed that we're infallible but we expect the same amount of respect as any other adult when discussions come up. Its one of the signs of a "Problem Player" discussed in the books and its a pretty serious situation.
On other fronts, our Pathfinder game got moved to Sundays with the new campaign starting and so far its been interesting. The current character I'm playing is much different from my previous one but, do to story ties, certain shared characteristics show through from time to time. Since I chose "Chaotic Good" as an alignment, this isn't really a problem but it should be interesting to see how things proceed. It could go either way really, hero or anti-hero at this point. Either way, I found the perfect prestige class on the Pathfinder database; Daredevil. Not only does it have fighting styles (which is awesome since I'm playing a Monk variant) but it also has parkour as one of the abilities gained, which I think is cool. I've started leading up to this transition already with the addition of various handholds and decorations on the group "headquarters" for the specific purpose of being able to scale the building from locations.
We decided to pick up a PS3 (Playstation 3) for Christmas and I've been having a lot of fun with that too. We've got both Batman games (Arkham Asylum and City), Warhammer 40k Space Marine, the Assassin's Creed games up to 3, Skyrim. Basically, a lot of neat and interesting games that have kept me interested and intrigued as I worked my way through them. An interesting article in Game Informer talked about how a lot of good storytelling has been going in videogames lately, and while I don't completely agree I will say that certain series have definitely had the benefit of good writers. In particular most of the Assassin's Creed games have had very engaging plots and they've endeavored to get you emotionally invested in the characters to the point where when one of the main ones died I was definitely emotionally moved. Its become less like being a detached third party now and more like roleplaying in that you seem to get so invested that you feel a lot of things during the course of a game, from sadness to elation.
Finally, last but not least, I got some new miniatures and supplies, including two very cool basing supply kits. I have a couple of figured ready to go, and some scenic display bases as well. My one big project is still a major conversion to make a mounted Skaven Warlord. I have all the necessary parts (and some I didn't even plan to have but which will make cool additions) but the one thing I lack is the usual epoxy putty. Generally, with miniatures, I use a brand called "Green Stuff" (because its two parts are colored yellow and blue so that you'll know its properly mixed when it turns green) but no play around here sells it. Games Workshop has some of their own, but its two tiny strips for a hugely inflated price which I refuse to play. We found an epoxy putty at Menard's in the plumbing supply isle, since plumbers have been using such putties for a long time now to fix pipes. My only concern is that Green Stuff takes about 24 hours to cure and has a working time of probably half an hour to an hour depending, whereas this stuff supposedly cures in 20 minutes and has a working time of 2 to 3 minutes. While this might not seem like a problem, keep in mind that I have to be able to get this stuff where I need it to go and sculpt it into the shapes I need to complete the figure and they have to be recognizable as the components I've sculpted otherwise its a wasted effort. And since this stuff supposedly hardness to the strength of steel, its unlikely that I'll simply be able to disassemble the final product and start over. Anyhow, here's hoping!
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