Mutant Past

This is a writeup of a session that happened over 3 months ago! I wanted to do it for a long time now, but been unable due to my laziness/schedule. Still, it was so much fun that, even after so long, it still feels like it happened just a week ago.

It started with me and Julia trying to convince our friend Adam to play some D&D with us, since we knew he has played RPGs in the past. He said that he would like to, but is afraid that he's gonna kill it, since he always had problems with immersing into the game world. I told him that random jokes and bursting into laughter is nothing bad, but he wasn't quite convinced.

That is when I devised a master plan to lure him into gaming with us.

Since I was already pretty stoked about playing some Mutant Future I decided to kill two pigeons with one rock (or whatever that idiom is in English) and use the gonzo atmosphere of the game to convince Adam. Knowing what he likes, I showed him one illustration form MF handbook (the 50's astronaut sheriff riding a giant spider-chicken from page 23) and said: " Hey dude, look at this! Maybe that's what you'd like to play?"

He obviously laughed and said it's an awesome idea, but he was still kinda nervous about it. I told him not to worry, that we're gonna have loads of fun. Finally when an opportunity appeared, we met at my house.

We started in a most peculiar way. By rolling a joint (another step in my plan to make us feel relaxed and comfortable) and deciding when to order pizza, since the time pepperoni hits the gaming table is crucial to the whole evening. Order it too early, or too late and the game might be delayed/interrupted/suddenly ended by the heaviness caused by the cheese. We settled to eat and smoke in the break between making characters and playing.

And so character creation begun, while the joint lay on the table like a loaded Chekov's gun.

It soon became clear that we won't really need it. Choosing races and rolling mutations was enough to bring us to our knees and laughing to tears.

Adam quickly picked a synthetic android (though I tried to tempt him into making a robot on custom rules), but Julia couldn't decide whether to make a mutant plant or an animal. I decided that they can create two characters each and pick the one they like better, keeping the other as a back up since I still felt a bit uneasy with new monsters and not knowing how fast they can kill the party (a party of only 2 mind you).

Julia ended up with a nameless palm tree (thanks Jeff):

Str: 14 Dex: 17 Con: 16 Int: 14 Wil: 12 Cha: 10
Hp: 49 AC: 7

Mutations:
• Aprehinsile Tendrils (Dex 10)
• Radioactive Emissions (150ft./10d6)
• Pituitary Deformation
• Density Alteration
• Meta Concert
• Echo-location
• Unique Sense (smell water for 1 mile)

Pretty badass, isn't it? Her second character was no less awesome. It's a wolf, with wings and Vampiric Field, Killing Sphere and Control Weather mutations!

Adam was less successful with his rolls (and yes, I made him roll for mutations, cause it's funnier that way). He set out to create an assassin android, but this is what he ended up with:

Mr. Apple, Synthetic Android

Str: 14 Dex: 15 Con: 13 Int: 13 Wil: 11 Cha: 6
Hp: 50 AC: 7

Mutations:
• Chameleon Epidermis
• Optic Emission (3d6)
• Aberrant Form (large legs, twice the speed)

In other conditions, this would be a great character, but compared to Julia's doom bringing dendro-carnivores, his was kinda weak. I was trying to cheer him up by telling him he's rolling mutations that are in line with his original idea of an assassin, but than he rolled those damn funny large legs. He ended up drawing a huge all-star sneaker as his character pic.

His other character was also quite on the other side. It's a duck that spits napalm!

After we finished filling out character sheets and buying useless equipment (like a dog for an android, about which we forgot instantly), we took the aforementioned break. We ordered pizza, chilled for a couple of minutes and smoked that damn joint... This was a mistake.

You see, I especially made it extra light, so that it would just loosen us up and not send us flying under the ceiling. But the moment we started playing and eating pizza, all hell broke loose. In a good sense. Though I was the DM, I felt like watching Mutant Big Lebowski (and not because of drugs).

My players simply blew me away. The dialogues between the Palm Tree and Mr. Apple (aka the cowardly assassin android) were just pure gold. Every several minutes we would all roll on the floor laughing, because of something we would say. It was also the first time in my life I was afraid someone might choke to death on pizza.

Still, I feel that drugs had nothing to do with it. Mutant Future is just a great game and after the game we agreed we didn't need any superficial help in having ultimate fun.

I won't reveal much of what happened during the session, as I used some great stuff from this blog and my players might go back there. Let me just say, they were running away from giant anthropomorphic ants.

What I can say though, is that they solved a mystery of who's killing people in a small mutant western town, run by Roby - a sheriff that's a blend of those two guys.

Everything played out great. There were moments of genuine tension when the players where investigating an abandoned, supposedly haunted house. And some comedy relief when they found out that the strange creatures living underneath the house are actually cowardly Cockroachoids who will sell them the information they need for a nice load of shit.

In the end, both Julia and Adam were screaming for more and that's what is a measure of a good game. I think that, with the exams out of our way, I will try to go for a full on session in a bit darker tone. Still, for retro-stupid gaming, MF is probably unbeatable!

Session Quotes:

Me: " You see ...."
Julia: " I HAVE NO EYE'S DAMMIT!"

2 minutes later

Me: " You are walking down an old, squeaking staircase, it's pitch black and you can't see..."
Julia: "For fuck sake man!"

close to the end of the game

Julia: "Hey man, what happened to your dog?"

Another Lame Entry

After making bold statements about my posting plans, it was obvious that I had to fail, . Somehow I didn't realize how tired I will be at the end of the exam session. Still, I have prevailed and so did Julia. We pretty much owned everything.

To celebrate I cut my hair, changing it from something like this, to something that can be most closely described as half mohawk.

I was surprised to find that it enraged my father to the point of telling me that if I want to continue living in my family house, I will have to pay rent. And that's just ridiculous.

So I am on the verge of finding a stable job and moving out. And being fucking poor...

Still, I am in high spirits. I feel that, paradoxically, this is a healthy turn of events.

I am also planning on finally keeping this blog up to date, though some minor fallbacks will surely occur due to my present situation.

Next post: Mutant Future!!!

Sailing stones gather no moss

I'm back! Though the exams aren't over yet and there is still some work ahead of me, I decided to come back to my blog and give it a bit of a makeover.

The other reason for this and the upcoming entries is that I accumulated a lot of ideas over the past month and I don't want to loose them. Thus, I'll gradually try to improve my posting rate over the next two weeks.

Here is a quick one, that came to me while I was customizing my template.

I've found the new title photo on Julia's tumblr. It pictures the phenomena known as Sailing Stones. Here's what wikipedia has to say on the subject:

"a geological phenomenon where rocks move in long tracks along a smooth valley floor without human or animal intervention. They have been recorded and studied in several places around the Death Valley, where the number and length of travel grooves are notable. The force behind their movement is not understood and is the subject of research."

Awesome?! Hell yes, but it get's even creepier:

"Speed is an unknown variable. Since these stones are rarely transported and nobody has witnessed the movement, the speeds at which the rocks travel are not known."

That's right, nobody has ever witnessed it, even though there were many attempts to observe or record the stones movements.

For me it sounds like:

The Secret of the Sailing Stones

Long time ago, a powerful being of unknown origin ripped the veil of time and space, entering the material plane. Scholars still argue about the origin of the being and it's impact on the world. Some say it was a god, others claim it was a demon and few claim it was neither. Though the dilemma has long been labeled as impossible to solve, it is agreed that those long gone events were the source of an ancient legend, that a Great Evil has been turned into stone and than shattered into a million pieces, so that it could never regain it's power.

To this day, magicians and foolish merchants embark into the Clay Desert to collect blocks of black stone-metal. The stones are said to move in mysterious ways drawing strange shapes on the surface of the desert. Many have died in search of the moving Death Stones (as they are often called) and it is said that some men have been found crushed in their sleep by stones that moved overnight, while others, blinded with greed, chased a single stone for days using up supplies left for the journey back.

In common speech the material from the stones is known as Death Metal. It is rumored that it can produce blades that can cut through steel as if it was flesh. However, few such weapons exist as it is widely believed that Death Metal is cursed and any weapon made out of it will eventually betray it's wielder and get him killed. Stories about slabs of the material disappearing over night, or weapons moving on their own only strengthen the fear and prejudice against anyone in possession of such artifact. It is a common saying that "No man can wield death itself and live".