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Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Blood Ties - Session 01

The first session is scheduled for Sunday February 5th.  Bozena, if you want to host this one go for it.  Otherwise we can go to Shevon's house to keep the rotation going.

Here is what we know about our protagonists going into the first session:

Daniela is an Italian native who is studying to earn a Ph. D. in Psychology of Religion at the Pontifical Gregorian University (PUG) in Vatican City.  A recent report of a case of credible stigmata at a small church called “Santa Teresa de Ávila” in Chicago caught her attention.  Investigating the validity of this report will be helpful in finishing her thesis, and also to satisfy her personal curiosity in the possibilities of the Holy Spirit.

Daniela has been put in contact with Dr. Kenneth Mason, a representative from Loyola University, a sister organization of the PUG, in Chicago.  Dr. Mason has arranged for Daniela to be picked up from O’hare and brought down to the Logan Square neighborhood where she has arranged to rent a studio apartment in a recently converted warehouse for her stay.

Violet is a Chicago native who has been living outside of Chicago for the past 10 years as a result of her involvement with the prosecution of Francisco (Frankie) Pena for arson and the attempted murder of her parents.  Following the court case, Violet’s family left Chicago with the insurance money they received from the destruction of their neighborhood market business.

Violet has kept in touch with her best friend from the old neighborhood over the years.  A week ago she received a cryptic email from her best friend Lucia (Lucy) that urgently asked for her to return to Chicago to help her.  Her message wasn’t specific about the danger she was in, but Lucy has never been one to ask for help unless something really big was wrong.  Violet tried to call Lucy several times, but has been unable to get a hold of her.  Deciding that Lucy really needed her she purchased a plane ticket and took a week off of work to find and help her friend.

In the back of Violet’s mind is the realization that Frankie’s sentence would have been up by now, and it was quite likely that he was probably still in the neighborhood.  Her plane is arriving at O'hare.  She needs to get to Logan Square and find Lucy.
-------------Session Summary--------------

Characters introduced:
Esme - Sister of Lucy, real estate agent
Rudy (Brown) - Friend of Lucy
Phil (reporter) and Jack (camera man) - interviewed Daniela
Dr. Kenneth Mason - Professor of Theology at Loyola University
Beth - Landlord and resident at Daniela's apartment building
Father Soto - Priest at Santa Teresa de Ávila
Officer Connerty - Policeman, acquaintance of Rudy

I am not going to provide a summary this week, I hope the character list is sufficient to remind you of what has taken place thus far.

7 comments:

  1. Make sure you have your whole character sheet completeTryd before the session. As you walk around in your day to day life be thinking about the skills you imagine your character having. pay attention to things you do everyday that might clue you into some useful skills for your character.

    I like to think of cool words and/or actions and turn them into skills. For example: I have always wanted to create a character with the skill "Goad." They would verbally taunt people into brashly attacking them in anger, or just pissing them off as a distraction. Another example: "hustle." The character could trick an opponent into thinking they aren't very good at something. It's like a "lying" skill but more specific.

    I like having very specific skills, and I using slick vocabulary on my character sheets. Give it some thought, something you will find a really cool skill for your character that makes a lot of sense, but wasn't something you would have immediately stumbled upon.

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  2. I have 70% of the plot figured out. That is usually a good percentage to understand at the beginning. I know the big twists, but I have left lots of room for small twists. As we play I may adjust major items based on our findings. This is coming together on my end pretty well. We always name each game, it makes it easier to refer to them, this game will probably be named "Blood Ties." As a result I will rename this post as: Blood Ties - Session 01

    Hopefully we will meet this coming Saturday. Please reply if you know you can't make it.

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  3. Wait, I thought we were thinking Sunday the 5th? I actually have to work on Saturday. I could do Sunday, though.

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  4. Il primo – time and place: I have to work this Saturday too and I thought that we have decided on Sunday, the 5th at10: 30 a.m. Also I don't think we would feel comfortable playing in my apartment; my roommate is always home and she isn’t very friendly. If you guys want, we could have a session in my office in Mount Prospect, no one would bother us there. If not, we have to ask Shevon to have us over in her lovely house. Please let me know what you want to do.

    Il secondo - I have been having a lot of fun developing Daniela's character these past two weeks and here is what I patched together:

    I don't want her to have any expectations or opinions about the case in Chicago she is coming to investigate, I would like her to be open-minded about it. Her perspective on life is spiritual but also scientific and I'd like her to have a balance between these two (at least at the beginning). She believes that science cannot explain true miracles but it has the ability to determine if those miracles are legitimate. Until she collects enough information about the Chicago stigmata, it is not going to matter if Vatican expects her to prove this particular case wrong or right.

    Her internal conflict is not between science and religion, not between what is real and what is not but how far one can go into spirituality without crossing borders established by Catholic Church. She has been tempted by knowledge and practices that are not necessarily approved by her religion. I want her to be interested in parapsychology and maybe begin looking into occultism, mysticism etc.
    When Daniela was a teenager her father disappeared during one of her parents’ trip to Spain while doing research on their book on unexplained spiritual occurrences. Shortly after that, Daniela’s mother who had always considered herself a visionary was officially diagnosed with a multiple personality disorder and has been placed in a mental institution. Daniela herself just started having spiritual experiences and visions and she is just beginning to second-guess her mother’s condition.

    I am thinking about following aspects and skills. We can discuss it, modify or change them on Sunday.

    Aspects:
    • Spirituality / mysticism / occultism
    • Curiosity
    • Empathy

    Skills:
    • Detecting lies (2)
    • Deductive reasoning (2)
    • Research (1)
    • Observant (1)
    • Others naturally trust me (1)
    • Psychology (1)
    • Religious traditions (1)

    It is still all a little fuzzy but I'm slowly getting there. :o)

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  5. I wrote Sunday on the Post but wrote Saturday on my comment. I meant Sunday, sorry for the confusion.

    If you have a place to host the session Bozena lets go there. If you'd prefer not to host it, let's go to Shevon's place. Let us know which one you decide.

    Regarding Daniela: Nice write up. I like what you have worked up. It seems to me that both of you understand your characters very well going into this. It will really help with the flow of the game since you won't have to dig to deep to figure out what your characters reactions will be to things. However, I hope to keep you on your toes anyhow. Your aspect/skill list looks great. It very rounded and logical to your character concept. I particularly like "Deductive Reasoning." Nice vocabulary!

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  6. I have added a character list to the bottom of the post above. I am really backed up on studying for my next exam on the 18th. Hopefully your notes from the session and the character list is enough to help you recall the last session.

    Keep up the attention to detail as we play. I really like the familiarity that both of you have with your characters. Think of what has happened thus far, and think of the things that you will want to look into when we get back to the game. Think in terms of goals: immediate goals, short-term goals, and long-term goals.

    I am really excited about this game, I think this could become one of the best games I have ever played. See you on the 19th!

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