Actual Play - Iron Road (10/16/2010)

[seannittner]

GM: Scott White
Players: Sean (Goldman), Ian (Cartack), Alan (Spice) and Eric (Kal)
System: Apocalypse World.

Have I mentioned that I like trains? I’m not like a train nut or anything I just like riding in them, seeing all the miles of train track and considering the awesome power that transportation on that scale represents. I like the powerful

Comments

Training

[amberley]

I'm not like a train nut or anything

Keep telling yourself that, and we'll play along. Someday you should take the Transcanada trip.

Thanks for the great summary of the game you played in. The angel in my game was named Kal, too. What's up with that?

I did run AW in the afternoon at the Minicon, set in the Ozarks Ghostwood (set 50 years after the 1919 Flu killed off most of the world), but the Chris H's Savvyhead's Land Train didn't make an appearance. Also, the Land Train runs on coal, not ghosts. The coal smoke keeps the ghosts away. Of course, then you need coal, and wood to shore up the coal mine, which comes from trees you have to be careful don't have ghosts tangled in the branches. It's always one thing or another, in Apocalypse World.

Re: Training

[seannittner]

I figured it out. Kal sounds like Mal and we all have a crush on Nathan Fillion. Maybe? I mean, I do. So does everyone in the room I'm in right now (which is 2, which more than 1).

Ahh... then I want my railroad spike back! I kid. I wasn't sure if the land train was part of the setting or just a creation of Hanrahan's. And coal does sound like a better fuel (ghost are so hard to cram into a furnace).

How did your game go? I mean the in a relative sense, compared to the standard carlawesomeness? (I didn't miss a space there, I think "carlawesomeness" should be a new metric for games, it's like inventing Celsius if Kelvin came first, even a 0 is pretty damn high!).

Re: Training

[amberley]

The Land Train was Hanrahan's doing, so properly the Spike of Destiny should belong to him. I'll take care of that. Of course, the drawback to trains is that people will naturally want to rob them. And it's hard
to resist the temptation to steal from Buster Keaton's immortal The General.

My game went well, the player of the Operator wrote it up at http://liralen.livejournal.com/906573.html. I like the Ghostwoods setting a lot, but I should stay away from gangs in 4 hour slots, fun as they are.

You may find fights more interesting if people try to seize things more interesting than the other side's life (which as you note, tends to degenerate into too-long fights to the death). Fleeing in terror or surrender are also fine results. Now what will the PCs do with their prisoners?

[ext_291659]

Thanks for the great writeup Sean. I appreciate it and there's lots to think about there.

Seriously you players made the game for me, and I pretty much agree with your assessment of what worked and what did not. Think the game would play very different given a different set of players an love letter results. The love letters shared three or four major plot points between them one of which didn't even appear on any of the four playbooks chosen.

My note pad was a 22x18 pad and a batch of colorful markers really made quick sketching of the scene easy and big enough to not require someone to grab it and squint at it while everyone else wonders what there is to see.

Just glad to see Apocalypse World getting played and show it's stuff. I love this game!

Ghost (repellent) train sounds pretty awesome, too.

[seannittner]

Yeah, I would have loved to see a few of the other Love Letter complications. Awesome game Scott!

Heh heh... and what is it with Savvy Heads and Trains?