preface
After more than a year of playtesting this baby with my group, Martin, a member of such group decided he wanted to take a stab at GMing the system with another group and see how it plays out with them. This is his report.Introduction
It’s my first time using the Chimera system from the other side of the rolled dice, and my second time as a GM. Needless to say I was both extremely nervous and incredibly excited! The players wanted to play something more pirate like and I had the perfect setting for this, an old favorite (probably one that I’ve played the most) called Sinister Seas.
Cast
- Puch Tuhata II – Male Pixie – (Ranger)
- RX-69, Rubikon – “Male” Golem – (Mage/Caster)
- Yorick “Riot” Rokas – Male Elf (Monk)
- Dragonlinux – Male Dragua (Fighter)
INTRODUCTION
The adventurers all arrive on their own to the tavern in order to advance their particular agendas; RX-69 looking for his creator or someone that might have knowledge about him, and possibly a means to get to Arcanum, where he might be able to acquire more intel. At this moment he spots an Elf telling stories about his voyages and what he believes to be the true cause of The Sundering. Yorick Rokas is sitting on top of a table telling stories when he is asked by one of the pixie barmaids to please step down and they both get a nasty look from the bar manager at the end (a man of 7ft of stature, clearly someone you do not want to mess with).
As he steps down he gets questioned by RX-69 about a man named Otto von Drillbrok III, although he doesn’t exactly recall the name, he knows there are multiple people like him both in Arcanum or Gil-Harad that could provide with more details.
As this is happening, on the other side of the bar, Puch appears to have won a game of cards versus a group who decides to leave him be after they’ve lost; without a second to enjoy his victory, Dragonlinux sits down and asks how he was able to win when he didn’t have the cards to win (all while taking one of the drinks on the table), Puch ignores him and continues drinking.
On a corner there’s a female Khapash dressed like a proper femme fatale, a male Human that oddly resembles a Russian wrestler and a flamboyantly dressed male Elf that seem to be getting some attention, from time to time some people seem to come, write something down and leave.
After a while the burly bar manager calls for those interested for some decent coin or to be able to pay their tabs to go to the aforementioned individuals and get a job, which multiple people do including our group of adventurers. After an exchange between the trio and the adventurers, it ends with the Khapash saying “If you survive the night, at dawn look for The Bulwark ship at the docks”.
After this the group sat together discussing some stuff as the tavern begins to empty, some group of rascals decided that now as good a time as any to get some coin; they fought the adventurers which succeeded defending themselves pretty well (although the monk took some decent damage). When the dust settled, there was a knock on the door before a man that appears as a seasoned captain of the seas accompanied by a young girl (blindfolded and in shackles) chimed in, when he looks at the bar he states that those there deserved to set foot on The Bulwark and to go with him immediately, the Human applauds the adventurers' success and tells them to join after a mindless banter with the bar manager.
conclusion
I’ll admit the session advanced fairly quickly and quite smoothly, the players were very engaged with everything going on and very curious to their surroundings ^_^;. Two of the players already had their characters ready and had a deep background for their characters before the session started. I only had to QA them and do some minor tweaks here and there, while answering and helping the other two that hadn’t been able to read much into the system. The most surprising or fascinating thing was how quickly they understood how the system worked and even went as far as to assist the players that weren’t ready.
Took advantage of this to go over a few of the possible outcomes and the enemy creation rules before we started, in case combat did happen. I decided to use the optional rule of Powers as Ammo for this setting to test a theory I had while maintaining the current Power Point system:
Gaining Powers: To gain powers you must first choose the Manifest Power talent under the Wilder Talent tree on page XX. Once you have taken the talent you need to make a few choices (see below),
Choose a Power Source: As the name implies, power sources are from where your powers originate. This choice is purely cosmetic in most cases, however, some of them might make minor mechanical changes to how powers work to fit the theme they describe. Choose a Power Group & a Power. All powers that share a similar theme are put together under a power group. When you first choose the Manifest Power talent you get to choose a power group which you get to add to your list of power groups you have access to, and then you get to choose a power from that same power group and add that power to your list of powers known. Each power group also has special effects or benefits right under their description which you also get when you add them to your list of power groups you have access to.
As your character progresses you can spend 1 XP to add one additional power from a power group you have access to or you could also choose to spend 1 XP to gain access to a new power group you do not have access to instead. If you do, you add the power group to your list and you gain the special effects or benefits under its description but not to the powers listed under it.
Learning New Power Groups & Powers: To learn new power groups or powers you need to spend some downtime researching and practicing in order to learn them in addition to spending 1 XP. The GM will tell you how long it will take. If you find tutelage the time is reduced by half, leaving you with leisure time to pursue other activities during your downtime.
*While using this as optional rule:
You fuel your powers through a reserve of personal power represented in Power Points. You start with and have a maximum of 3 Power Points which you can use to amplify your powers. Power Points function similar to ammo; as long as you have Power Points you can manifest powers and once you run out of them you can't manifest them until you regain at least one. You regain 1 Power Point per short rest up to your maximum.Further testing is required.
The area where the group got confused most often where the difference between difficulties Easy (3 Successes), Medium (5 Successes), Hard (7 Successes) and the Hits (4-6) and Misses (1-3 landed on the die), that when they had advantage/disadvantage and forgetting which was their focus. I’ll go over this at the beginning of the next session and answer any questions they have.
0 Comments