My Life in Gaming 6: Santa Barbara Ars Magica
Okay, it's been a while since I've posted anything and this one deserves to be written.
When I think over my time in gaming a few games really stand out. Faiyne's Dungeon certainly, and the Plains of Prax ... and Gelwich/Aquarda with the gang in Santa Barbara.
A couple of quotes come to my mind from this time. "Other people came to grad school so that they could get a degree; Angus came here to make better games." "Many of Angus' individual episodes were so-so, but the build of the campaign and the sense of community made it incredible." That may not be the whole story, but it is a starting point. ;-)
So, here I am at UC Santa Barbara in the grad program for Medieval History. I loved my time there for all that it never came together, but there was this one roadtrip up to San Luis Obispo and the game store there ... and we discovered a game. The biggest question was which one of us was actually going to pick up the game -- Ars Magica, a roleplaying game set in the 12th century, with the Middle Ages as it was ... but with all thing things people believed were real actually existing. What could be better for our group.
Brother Sir Brennan Earthmover. Turbator Ossium. K'Gaa Whispering-goat. Geleg. These names and so many others live in my heart, the magi, the wizards of Gelwich Covenant, later Aquarda Covenant. In game terms, these characters passed through about 35-40 years; this was played out over about 3 years, with breaks for other games.
What was it about this game that drew us in so deeply? Probably the combination of factors -- a new game seemingly designed specifically for our group, deep characterizations, a magic system that seriously kicked ass, and the strong desire on all the people in the game to create a bigger story. With Kenji, our misplace samurai, Dalton Erdell (whose tagline always seemed to be "It's not my fault!"), and many others, this game just grew and grew in the telling.
Never before had I been in a game that required keeping track of so many different characters. In the base game everyone was supposed to create three characters, and most folks created more than that, certainly. And the families! Covenfolk married, bred ... and even died of old age. That is a bit of a change up from normal rpgs -- a real sense of the passage of time.
To begin the game, I had to elder NPC magi to watch over the group ... and in the very first adventure one of them died. From then on in Claude was always insistent -- "Don't lose another elder mage!" Well, we tried ... and failed, but we had fun along the way.
Who could possibly forget The Interview when we had new magi trying for entry into the covenant. "Pretend that bush is attacking the covenant," said Sir Brennan; "What would you do to defend us." K'Gaa looks and says, "But the bush is not attacking the covenant." "Sparky's in the club!" cries Claude... Thankfully in our very last episode the covenant was attacked by bushes ... well, trees, but it took a while to get there.
Over the course of the game game we got into more trouble than we could possibly have imagined. We ransacked the Lost Covenant of Calebais and found The Bell that became our bane for the rest of our history. We found that there was such a thing as Too Much Vis ... at least when you have a dragon's heart that is a solid 20 pawns and there are madmen who actually want it. We were involved in experiments of genealogy to find out if nobility was a truly inheritable trait that would show forth ... after switching a newborn noble and peasant child between their respective families. We pretty much overthrew a small kingdom and masqueraded as angels. We dealt with a baron possessed by a demon and were forced to move from home to a new site, losing many along the way. We learned that Brennan was no Geleg, in multiple senses. We built a very strange bridge that had unexpected consequences when viewing it. We had identical triplets who eventually became 2, then one, due to deaths.
But for me one of the most stand-out visions from the game was a long session I ran. The specific session slips from my mind now, and that was not the important part. What was intriguing was seeing Claude the next day present me with several sheets of paper. "What is this?" "The Covenant charter." "How long have you been working on this?" "Last night." "After the game?!?" "Oh, that. Yeah, well we just stayed after you left and held an in-character council meeting and put the charter together. We were probably there for another six hours." "Six hours after a long session?!?" "Well, we were in the zone." I just accepted that...
People came and went in the game, not just characters, but players as well, yet there was always the core. Bob, Doug, Alain, Claude -- they were the hard center of the game. The faced Calebais. They dealt with Curwen (You wanna fireball up yer snoot, laddy?") and Dan O'Thunder. They went to the Tribunals. They killed a dragon by paving him over. They learned about their masters, their apprentices, the wider politics of the kingdom and so much more. I could keep going with the details, but let me just say this -- I don't think I have ever had a deeper, more satisfying campaign and I doubt I ever shall.
So, inhabitants of Gelwich & Aquarda, I salute you. Those were truly amazing times ... even if you never quite defeated Tarrabil, Lord of the Groaning Oaks.
When I think over my time in gaming a few games really stand out. Faiyne's Dungeon certainly, and the Plains of Prax ... and Gelwich/Aquarda with the gang in Santa Barbara.
A couple of quotes come to my mind from this time. "Other people came to grad school so that they could get a degree; Angus came here to make better games." "Many of Angus' individual episodes were so-so, but the build of the campaign and the sense of community made it incredible." That may not be the whole story, but it is a starting point. ;-)
So, here I am at UC Santa Barbara in the grad program for Medieval History. I loved my time there for all that it never came together, but there was this one roadtrip up to San Luis Obispo and the game store there ... and we discovered a game. The biggest question was which one of us was actually going to pick up the game -- Ars Magica, a roleplaying game set in the 12th century, with the Middle Ages as it was ... but with all thing things people believed were real actually existing. What could be better for our group.
Brother Sir Brennan Earthmover. Turbator Ossium. K'Gaa Whispering-goat. Geleg. These names and so many others live in my heart, the magi, the wizards of Gelwich Covenant, later Aquarda Covenant. In game terms, these characters passed through about 35-40 years; this was played out over about 3 years, with breaks for other games.
What was it about this game that drew us in so deeply? Probably the combination of factors -- a new game seemingly designed specifically for our group, deep characterizations, a magic system that seriously kicked ass, and the strong desire on all the people in the game to create a bigger story. With Kenji, our misplace samurai, Dalton Erdell (whose tagline always seemed to be "It's not my fault!"), and many others, this game just grew and grew in the telling.
Never before had I been in a game that required keeping track of so many different characters. In the base game everyone was supposed to create three characters, and most folks created more than that, certainly. And the families! Covenfolk married, bred ... and even died of old age. That is a bit of a change up from normal rpgs -- a real sense of the passage of time.
To begin the game, I had to elder NPC magi to watch over the group ... and in the very first adventure one of them died. From then on in Claude was always insistent -- "Don't lose another elder mage!" Well, we tried ... and failed, but we had fun along the way.
Who could possibly forget The Interview when we had new magi trying for entry into the covenant. "Pretend that bush is attacking the covenant," said Sir Brennan; "What would you do to defend us." K'Gaa looks and says, "But the bush is not attacking the covenant." "Sparky's in the club!" cries Claude... Thankfully in our very last episode the covenant was attacked by bushes ... well, trees, but it took a while to get there.
Over the course of the game game we got into more trouble than we could possibly have imagined. We ransacked the Lost Covenant of Calebais and found The Bell that became our bane for the rest of our history. We found that there was such a thing as Too Much Vis ... at least when you have a dragon's heart that is a solid 20 pawns and there are madmen who actually want it. We were involved in experiments of genealogy to find out if nobility was a truly inheritable trait that would show forth ... after switching a newborn noble and peasant child between their respective families. We pretty much overthrew a small kingdom and masqueraded as angels. We dealt with a baron possessed by a demon and were forced to move from home to a new site, losing many along the way. We learned that Brennan was no Geleg, in multiple senses. We built a very strange bridge that had unexpected consequences when viewing it. We had identical triplets who eventually became 2, then one, due to deaths.
But for me one of the most stand-out visions from the game was a long session I ran. The specific session slips from my mind now, and that was not the important part. What was intriguing was seeing Claude the next day present me with several sheets of paper. "What is this?" "The Covenant charter." "How long have you been working on this?" "Last night." "After the game?!?" "Oh, that. Yeah, well we just stayed after you left and held an in-character council meeting and put the charter together. We were probably there for another six hours." "Six hours after a long session?!?" "Well, we were in the zone." I just accepted that...
People came and went in the game, not just characters, but players as well, yet there was always the core. Bob, Doug, Alain, Claude -- they were the hard center of the game. The faced Calebais. They dealt with Curwen (You wanna fireball up yer snoot, laddy?") and Dan O'Thunder. They went to the Tribunals. They killed a dragon by paving him over. They learned about their masters, their apprentices, the wider politics of the kingdom and so much more. I could keep going with the details, but let me just say this -- I don't think I have ever had a deeper, more satisfying campaign and I doubt I ever shall.
So, inhabitants of Gelwich & Aquarda, I salute you. Those were truly amazing times ... even if you never quite defeated Tarrabil, Lord of the Groaning Oaks.