Robert Bohl's Demihumans Playtest: Session 4 A Magic Orchid Raid Turns Violent

+Robert Bohl's Demihumans Playtest: Session 4
A Magic Orchid Raid Turns Violent

After a more tame, focused session last week, today's tale brought plenty of fireworks and dramatic
turns. In attendance were Kain the Traitor, Donna the Dwarf, and Zug the Troll. At the end of the mayhem, the Flower of Human Antipathy withered a petal, the enclave united behind the Company, and a heady brew of dark magic was uncovered in the swamp.

The Company was able to dip into a number of special moves: Endless Fury (orc move), Fruiting Bodies (troll move), Garden Pathways (troll move) and Adamantine Pact (dwarf move) were all activated. I feel that the Demiurge and players need to be in sync to make those moves maximally effective in terms of the fiction.

We did a pretty good job of this with 3 out of 4 of those moves. The one that I fumbled on was Fruiting Bodies, and this was mainly because it was used at the end of the session, and there were two characters in need of healing. The move ended up seeming too much like a D&D cleric healing spell than something really special, which it should be. I might add some pseudo-house rule make sure that the "invoking the unreal" moves count for more. It was cool that it was the troll player herself who brought up this at the end of the session.

Garden Pathways, Adamantine Pact, and Endless Fury were all dramatic and full of spice.

Key developments:

Donna (dwarf) and Zug (troll) were awoken in the very early morning to the sounds of screams coming from the edge of the enclave. They met a halfling and his companion, who led them into the swamp. There, they came upon the mutilated hanging corpse of a giant snake whose body muscle had been removed. There were burn marks laying about and the signs of evil magic. Donna was able to spot some polished stones resembling those worn by a mysterious elven woman magician named Wycraft.

The troll ended up fleeing the scene using Garden Pathways (this was in part the result of a negative reaction from the semi-sentient algae life form she keeps on a rock under her tongue). She rolled a 7, and chose to leave something unwanted behind. This "unwanted thing" ended up being an unnatural grey and cancerous tree growing in the center of the scene where the giant snake's corpse was hanging.

Donna (dwarf) returned to the enclave and awakened Kain (traitor) about Wycraft. The traitor knows the elf lives somewhere deep in the swamp. He advised the dwarf to join him later in the day to set out with an orc named Verik Torg who is leading a magic orchid hunting expedition which will take them deep in the swamp.

Still in the morning, a posse of humans appeared in front of the home of Eforis Nei (elf). They reported a brutal attack that has occurred on two humans (one of whom was killed), and they are convinced that evil magic is at work. (Note: the commonweal move resulted in the want of "horrors" being active.) They were wanting to take vengance on the elf. The members of the Company appeared and, using some Coerce with Violence moves, they got the posse to leave . . . but with threats of letting Squire Prador of the human army know!

The Company set out with Verik Torg and two half-orc women on an expedition to destroy magic orchids. When they came across an especially rich growth of the rare orchids, however, the troll sensed the wrongness of destroying the magic, even if it would make the area less appealing to humans. The company got into a heated, testy debate (the best kind, with good-spirited role playing in full force).The troll and the traitor ultimately turned against the orc and half-orcs while the dwarf reluctantly joined in. The session ended with a dramatic battle, two severely wounded orcs/half-orcs, and the large magical orchids saved.