|
The Harnish
Germany
Duisburg
NRW
Cult of The Harnish Leader
-
I'm just back from our second session of Mouse Guard and it was a good one (You can read about the first session here). We lost the extra player we had in session #1 (the boy that took on the role of the pregenerated character last session) so we were back down to our core four patrol members: Thomas Stonechip, the patrol leader; Vidar, grizzled patrol guard; Tess, the rather deceptive and conniving guard member; and Mullan, the down-on-her-luck, incompetent tenderpaw.
I started the session by reviewing the way traits could be used, both for and against a character's best interested, and how that related to earning checks in the Players' Turn. I also went over a quick summary of the previous session's events and hit the important facts the group had uncovered: That Tess, unbeknownst to the others had sneaked a look at the open mail and discovered one of the envelopes contained maps of tunnels leading from the Darkheather into the town of Pebblebrook. Tess had kept this knowledge a secret from the rest of patrol up to this point. Of course this was an open secret: The players all knew about it, but the characters didn't. We also went over each character's status in terms of conditions because both of the veterans were still Angry while Mullan was still Tired after being forced to spend the night sleeping in the inn's utility shed (she failed her Resource Test during Session #1).
Overview & Planning
Our campaign doesn't have a lot of preplanned plot going on - I have a basic idea involving a rebellion (based on the events described in the Fall 1152 graphic novel) and plans to undermine confidence in the Mouse Guard by aiding the weasels in raiding the village of Pebblebrook. That's about it. The events of Session #1 introduced the hint that somebody knows about tunnels running under the scent border between the Darkheather and Pebblebrook. Before the session I took a look at the character sheets and noticed that Mullan had as her goal "Avoid my enemy Kuba while we're in Elmoss." Hmmm, that's an interesting one.... so what if it's Kuba who is behind the plans? Maybe he's now a local crime boss. I then decided I would take advantage of Thomas's instinct "Always rush to the aid of any mouse in danger.." That instinct, as I've mentioned before, is pure story gold and just begs to be used exploited. Finally, I decided to give Tess a chance to exploit the knowledge she had.
With those decisions in mind, I followed the rulebook's guidelines for designing a mission: I choose two of the obstacle types and then set up a mission involving them - I chose Animal and Wilderness for this mission, reserving Weather and Mice for my twists. For the animal obstacle, I choose a Bullfrog; the Wilderness obstacle would be how to get across a pond to an island. With the challenges settled on and some flags/hooks from the characters selected, here is the premise I finally came up with:
Mission: Patrol is approached by an aging mouse begging them to rescue his relatives who have become trapped on an island in a nearby pond - the spring snow melt has swollen the pond and turned what is normally a peninsula into an island. The mouse's family is trapped on the island and hasn't been heard of in more than a week.
Plot: The mouse has actually been paid to lie to the patrol - there are no mice on the island but rather it's the home of a hungry bullfrog. Someone wants the patrol dead because the letter with the tunnel plans showed up opened and the assumption is the patrol knows their significance.
Summary
We started out with some minor scenes in the tavern/inn - Thomas and Vidar are discussing what they should do next, while Tess was busy trying to eavesdrop on the locals. Meanwhile, Mullan, still on Thomas's hit list because of her repeated mess ups on the last mission, was out in the yard cleaning equipment. Thomas and Vidar are approached by the older mouse in a straw hat who begged them to rescue his stranded family. Thomas instantly accepts the mission and the older mouse departs. Vidar at that point picks an argument with Thomas - he doesn't see the point of wasting a lot of time running a ferry service - he wants to head east and pick a fight with some weasels. The two get in to an argument in which Vidar points out how much more experience he has over Thomas. Thomas dismisses him almost immediately, shutting up the old mouse, with a wave of his paw and the words "I am the patrol leader. How many times have you been passed up for promotion?" before walking away.
Neither of the two characters is very good at arguments (i.e., persuasion or intimidation) and both blew their disposition rolls. Their social conflict was thus very short and sweet: Both attacked on Volley 1 and Thomas crushed Vidar in a single exchange.
Cut to the next scene: Mullan, out in the yard, sees an older mouse in a straw hat come out of the inn and talk with a younger mouse: The two exchange something and then go on their separate ways. She things nothing of it as Thomas appears a few moments later and tells her to gather her equipment. The group sets out for the pond and makes it there without incident: Mullan proves an able pathfinder this time. Thomas assesses the weather and decides that the day will be clear.
He actually failed the roll and so I opted to introduce a weather twist later on - it would start raining once it came time to leave the island.
They discover that they're going to need to build a boat or raft to get across to the pond and after a few hours later have built a rather impressive leaf canoe.
This was a funny challenge because nobody had the Boatcrafter skill - instead Thomas took the lead, untrained, and the others lent a hand: Mullan used her carpentry skill (+1D) while Tess contributed her rope (+1D). Vidar just complained... Thomas then threw in his Persona point, rolled and came up with 5 successes! Impressive.
Across the pond they go, paddling out to the island, which is quite small but heavily wooded. Mullan begins shouting to attract any mice on the island, while scouting around - she spots nothing. The group comes upon a great mound of mud near the center of the island. As they approach, one yellow eye pops open and then seconds later the bullfrog leaps at them. It's a fight to the death with some really good exchanges: Thomas begins by pushing Mullan out of the way and bringing up his shield just in time to block a headbutt from the frog. It knocks the shield to the ground but little else. Meanwhile, Vidar moves to attack but misses wildly. The next exchange has Mullan run and slide across the mud puddle on Thomas's shield, stabbing the frog in the nose with her knives. Meanwhile, Tess fires wildly with her bow, missing as the frog hip checks Vidar. Thomas then brings his mace around and knocks out several of the frog's teeth even as the frog lashes out with a back foot and sends Tess flying in to the pond. At this point, Vidar brings his great sword around in a tight arc and disembowels the frog.
It was a short but very intense fight: Both parties chose "death" as their goal - I made it clear that if the frog won, it intended on eating a couple of them. During the 3rd volley, the group saw a chance to take the frog out when Vidar rolled a 4 & 6 on his attack - he spent his last Fate point and picked up the 6, knowing he had a 50/50 chance of adding another success. It ended up generating two more successes (he rolled another 6, followed by a 4). The results were a dead frog, but also meant the group had to make a concession. We decided Tess would end up Sick from landing in the icy cold water, while Thomas was Tired from his exertions.
Tess was now soaked to the bone and Thomas exhausted. Mullan scouted the rest of the island but turned up no mice - she was fairly sure there had been mice present though (blown Scouting roll). Meanwhile, Tess is soaked and very cold - Vidar reveals his more generous side (one of his traits) and gives her his cloak to wear. Thomas decided to gut the frog to see what it had been eating and discovered no signs of any mice. He concluded the whole scenario had been a trap. After some more effort, the group returned to the mainland, but were forced to hike back to Elmoss in the rain. Both Thomas and Mullan also became Sick because of this. At that point the GM Turn ended.
Lots of mixed success/failure here. Mullan continues to fail over and over again on rolls which has given her a very comical, incompetent reputation as a tenderpaw which her player has fully embraced.
The Players' Turn involved Thomas securing inn rooms for everyone and Mullan remembering where she had seen the younger mouse before - this bit was a great piece of improvisation by Mullan's player (which again astounds me considering she came in to the game never having played a RPG before) - she rolled a success on her Will test and then offered the following without me even asking "He was a skinny little mouse I knew back in the orphanage named Langfingers. He also ended up getting in trouble for stealing." Uber-cool because I instantly decided Langfingers had taken up a job as a lackey of Kuba and it was Kuba who had plotted the patrol's deaths. Thus, the story had come full circle and now Mullan's enemy is part of the story. Tess took this time to reveal she had sneaked a look at the mail and what she discovered: This enraged Thomas (she had violated his trust and the guards' rules) but it played right into her belief.
Vidar, rather than trying to rid himself of his Angry condition (he's got the Fiery trait), decides to spend his check on hunting down the mouse in the straw hat. Mullan's info and her familiarity with Elmoss (her hometown), help Vidar and the old veteran ends up kicking in the guy's door and pinning him against the wall. The older mouse, whose name turns out to be Jake, spills his guts and explains that he was hired by Langfingers to send the patrol on the goose chase - Langfingers claimed it was "a joke on an old friend." Jake is really surprised to hear about the bullfrog and we end the session with the revelation that Langfingers works for Kuba.
Lots of mixed success/failure here. Mullan continues to fail over and over again on rolls which has given her a very comical, incompetent reputation as a tenderpaw which her player has fully embraced.
My Thoughts
Wow, the game is already starting to fire on all cylinders. The players spent a lot more time talking in character and some of them just plain get their characters. Mullan's player is remarkably skilled at taking narrative control, Tess's player understood how her belief & instinct could be used to create drama, and Vidar's player managed to throw out some gems out there throughout the session, including picking a fight with Thomas using Thomas's age as a criticism of his ability to lead, offering his cloak to the freezing Tess, and opting to stay Angry in order to spend his check on tracking down Jake. This last player is of particular interest also because he's the guy that last year kept asking me "but how do I actually play my character?" I can't wait to see where this is headed.
-
Alexander Mercer
United Kingdom
Huddersfield
West Yorkshire
-
Enjoying reading this, I picked up Mouse Guard at release, but have yet to run it.
Intending to run it before the end of the year for a group consisting of 2 people who haven't RPG'd before...
-
The Harnish
Germany
Duisburg
NRW
Cult of The Harnish Leader
-
Thanks. Some of the people from my regular Friday night group read my write-ups of these sessions on my blog and now they also want to play. The irony is that I had pitched the game unsuccessfully to them twice before - both times a couple of players balked at playing mice because they thought it was going to be too childish.
-
Yoki Erdtman
Sweden
Södertälje
-
Very entertaining story Michael, I'm hooked and will read the rest of your AP reports.
-
|
|
|
