Okay, let's see what my notes tell me.
Session 2: Getting to know stuff (exciting, isn't it?)
As it turns out, Tiagon's player got sick, so we only had two players at the table. Also, we started with a very detailed recap by Ierod's player, earning him a Fate point, and looked whether the guys wanted to change up their beliefs.
Ierod's player did: he changed his second belief to – "I will find out everything there is to know about Simos".
Simos's player did, too: he specified his third belief; instead of leading Tiagon on the path to darkness, he wanted to "give Tiagon the reputation of someone messing with the forces of darkness". Unfortunately, this belief did not come up, as too many other things interfered.
The players then told me what they were planning to do, and I reviewed my notes on what I had planned to throw in, which amounted to a lot, and then we started where we left off: at the breakfast with Prince Vitor.
Scene 1: If you like it, then you put a ring on itSitting at the large table, one of the minor nobles suggested, among ribald jokes, that Vitor should marry Telma, his right hand and a priestess. Ierod, who has a belief about making his cousin the queen, disagreed, and the first Duel of Wits broke out.
Noble's intent: Vitor should marry Telma
Ierod's intent: Vitor should marry a Penacorian noblewoman (e.g. his sister)
Ierod is a DoW monster, which means he had a starting disposition of 14 against an opponent with a disposition of 6. It went pretty much like you would expect. The noble tried a feint and an obfuscate, and managed, with his last point, to mark three points off of Simos' dispo, but Simos avoided, pointed, and dismissed him to -3.
Compromise (minor): Telma has to agree on Vitor's choice of a queen.
In the course of the scene, Vitor also told Ierod to visit the dead king's body. Simos and Ierod agreed to look for Xoana bint Brena together (she supposedly hired an assassin to kill Vitor) and meet after Simos's work was over in a run-down bar (the singing eel).
Scene 2: History swallows itselfAt work, Simos was visited by his contact for the smuggler's guild, Master Thoros, who told him that an old historian was being pursued by the Sisters of the Dawn (the Inquisition, basically), and that since the historian didn't have much money, but Simos was very much into history himself, maybe they could work out a deal. Simos had the historian, a man called Fasquito, sent to his home and met him right after work.
At home, Simos's secret and forbidden lover, Malik, had kept the historian somewhat distracted, but it soon became clear that Fasquito was kind of a git. Still, Simos was very interested in what Fasquito may have uncovered in the Tower of Night, one of the seven library towers of the city, the one with forbidden knowledge – it was quite possible that Fasquito knew something about Thareos, the lost god. So they started to talk about payment for getting Fasquito out of the city.
Simos' Intent: Fasquito tells me everything he knows about Thareos as a payment for getting him out.
Consequences: Since Simos's player wanted to take his time in persuading Fasquito to part with his forbidden knowledge, we had two consequences. The general consequence to failure was Fasquito tells him what he knows, but later on tells other people that he told Simos, meaning Simos might become a target for the Sisters, too. And the timed consequence was that by the time Simos and Fasquito were done talking, the guards were specifically looking for Fasquito at the gates (i.e., advantage dice to Perception / Observation tests).
Simos failed the test.
Still, Fasquito told him about Thareos: how Thareos was the god of life and death, of beginning and end, about how history was always repeating itself, how people would die and be reborn just like one day, the world would die and be reborn – according to Thareos, at least. How the Burning Wheel was Thareos's symbol, and how after the "Great Fall", when some holy artefact went missing from his major temple – probably after a raid – Thareos turned away from his people.
Then, Simos went on to disguise himself and Fasquito, he wrote a letter supposedly from Fasquito's mother how his sister had fallen ill, and he accompanied Fasquito to the gates to sweet talk the guards... where we hit a little roadblock, test-wise.
Here's what we did: Simos tested Disguise as a linked test (using Forgery as a FoRK – the letter), successfully for a +1D. And then
I had Fasquito test Inconspicuous to get past the guards looking for him, with +1D for the linked Disguise, and +1D for Simos help with Falsehood, against the guards' Peception, helped with +1D for many guards and +1D for looking specifically for Fasquito.
Intent: Get Fasquito out of the gates
Consequence: the guards recognize him, follow him out of the city and then grab him – and according to the consequences above, spills the beans about Simos.
I was a little iffy since it wasn't Simos testing, but Fasquito, and since the brunt of the consequence for failure also would hit Fasquito. But if I had had Simos test his better Inconspicuous (Fasquito had Beginner's Luck only), would that have been right (considering the "slower, louder, dumber" rule of group tests)?
Anyway, they barely managed to pass the test, and Fasquito was sent on his merry way. Simos turned around and hastened to the inn where Ierod had been waiting for almost two hours now...
Scene 3: Surprise attack after surprise attackIerod, indeed, had been sitting in the rotten bar, and he had been stared at, being quite obviously a nobleman. He also had been approached by the barmaid Agape, who, fitting to her station, was not buxom and drop dead gorgeous, but instead quite ugly, yet still trying to ply her trade. Ierod gave her a Steel coin (there's bronze, steel, and the rare gold coin – rare for commoners, that is) and told her that when Simos arrived, she was to give him a good time.
Which meant I got to play the unappealing harlot, and I loved it
Agape sat on Simos's lap, squeezed his manhood and dragged him into a backroom to make love, but Simos managed to placate her for a moment, tell her to get ready, then left the room and sent a one-armed sailor in who, miraculously, seemed to have set his eye upon the woman, and finally he fled the building. Ierod, having learned a little more what kind of man Simos was, followed.
Outside, the two started talking about their plans regarding Xoana, when suddenly they were beset by a
Winged Horror, creatures that came with the invaders a hundred years ago but have quickly multiplied and now hunt cats, dogs, rats or, if they are very hungry, unarmored humans like Simos and Ierod.
A Fight! ensued, another first for the group, and as it turned out having Speed B6, a multiplier of x12, Reflexes of B5 and a Long tail means you are pretty much unlikely to lose a positioning test, which means if you start out at Optimal with your opponents Out of Range, they are screwed. Ierod managed to close once, then failed locks and charged from Lunging, and Simos threw a dagger at the beast, but to no avail. On the other hand, Ierod was hit several times, but never with a mark result. Finally, Simos was poisoned. He took a Great Strike (B4 Severe hit, a Superficial wound), and then a few moments later got dizzy as heck – +5 to all further tests for now, and I even forgot the B5 wound and the necessary Steel test that should have followed.
Which wasn't too bad, because the fight still wasn't going much anywhere, and the annoyed horror took off into the night again, leaving Simos to stumble home and be cared for by Malik until the poison left his body – 11 hours later. Ierod also headed home for tonight, having once again not visited the dead king.
Interstitials: Looking for AnswersEarlier in the day, Ierod had tried to send word his former soldiers, looking for one who had witnessed the interrogation of the assassin by the "Ice Queen" of the inquisition, and we once again got into a little argument about Circles.
Intent: Find a soldier who witnessed the interrogation first hand, soon.
Consequence: The soldier would be too afraid of the Ice Queen to talk
Anyway, the player made the test with a success to spare, and named his buddy "Nemros".
It was now, on his way home, that Ierod was grabbed by Nemros. Nemros had been one of the guards who caught the assassin, and so he stood outside when the Ice Queen did her thing, which meant a lot of screaming first, then she asked him whether Xoana had hired him, and he screamed "yes" several times, and then she prayed with him before she killed him. Nice girl.
The next day, a newly recuperated Simos went shopping – he tried to find a present for his lover, Malik. However, using his City-Wise as a linked test for the Resources test led him not to a cheap shop, but to a tradesmen pretending to be cheap, but actually being quite expensive, and Simos failed his Resources test. Declining the gift of kindness to keep the tax in check, he then made his way to the library, a strange building designed by a madman and, at the same time as being the library, also being the local magical academy. He learned that only those who had a fitting patronage might enter the library towers, but that "General Vitor Ben Brena" (the academy being neutral on city affairs) was a suitable patron for the "general towers", i.e. if Simos wanted to learn about history or noble families.
A few days later, Ierod and Simos met Vitor for breakfast again, and Vitor admonished Ierod for not having visited his father yet, the man Vitor murdered: "If we have to pretend to be in mourning, at least do it right", Vitor said. Simos asked Vitor whether he could have his permission to visit the library, and Vitor agreed with a shrug. As it turned out, Vitor would have to write a letter for that, so Vitor ordered Simos to write his own letter and then he would put his sigil on. Simos had to make a Write test.
Intent: Write a fitting letter so that he gains entry to the towers of history and nobility.
Consequence: the letter is not accepted and Vitor is unwilling to sign another one.
Simos failed. He would have to find a different patron, or a different way inside. He did, however, offer Vitor to aquire rare items for him, should Vitor need some, basically offering his smuggling contacts. Vitor didn't really comment on that... yet.
Ierod also went to see Vitor. Ierod had agreed to find out whether Vitor and Telma had an affair, and he asked the Bastard Prince outright. Vitor smirked and denied, though he didn't see the harm in people believing he did. Ierod also asked Telma herself whether she wanted others to think she and Vitor had an affair, and was surprised to find out that Telma was a religious fanatic, claiming to have had visions about Vitor triumphant with her at his side, and so she didn't care what anyone thought. Ierod left, thinking how a straightforward, uncouth Warrior and a religious fanatic at his side might be a recipe for disaster, should things not go Vitor's way...
Ierod then visited another old friend of his, the smuggler Ochem ben Mesreni. He asked Ochem to find a guy that might follow Simos and find out where he lived. Ochem found a guy, but Ierod failed his Ressources test to hire him – but as the Gift of Kindness the guy agreed as a favor to both Ierod and Ochem to do the job anyway. Ochem then told Ierod that Simos was a member of the smuggler's guild, too (it's good to have the right relationships
), and so Ierod had the first of three necessary parts of information for his new belief (We agreed that in order to "know everything" about Simos, Ierod would have to know about Simos's smuggling, his gay Uchemi lover, and his heretical religious views).
Scene 3: Smuggler's HonorAnother few days later, the smuggler's guild met in a borrowed location. Quite quickly, the topic turned to the Bastard Prince and whether the smugglers should position themselves on his side, or the side of the ruling nobles. One smuggler suggested finding Xoana and getting her to safety as a sign of fealty to Patrizio ben Brena, while another suggested handing Xoana over to Vitor to gain his confidence, and Simos argued for keeping Xoana to themselves if they found her – he was disappointed, though, that the smugglers seemingly didn't know the whereabouts of the queen in hiding.
Master Thoros turned out to be a proponent of the old class, arguing for keeping the status quo, with Simos – following the theme of the campaign – taking up the mantle of Change and Progress. An argument flared up, and Simos received unlikely help from Ochem ben Mesreni, who knew that his friend Ierod would be on Simos's side – and it turned out that Ochems die was the success needed to overcome Thoros's abysmal 2 successes on six dice – Simos had managed to sway the smugglers in Vitor's favor, a nice success right at the end of the game.
Scene 4: Church BellsAt the same time, Ierod finally went to see the dead king, his slowly wasting body laid up before a pool of blood – for now, only an Ob 2 steel test, but it would get harder before the wake would be done –, and then went on to see the High Priestess, Eulalia, to first tell her what he found out about Telma, and then seduce the woman and get her on his side.
Eulalia proved to be relieved that Telma had no affair with Vitor, but she knew about Telma's fanaticism. She told Ierod that in order to publicly support Vitor, she would have to find some sign that the goddess Chumash also supported him, but privately, she was keen to hear his offer. Ierod offer was a dance and some whispered compliments.
We basically made a versus test to see who seduced whom, with the priestess of sexual love FoRKing "tantra-wise" and Ierod FoRKing Dancing into his (lower) Seduction skill. The winning party would get an advantage die for later Persuasion tests and similar, and as with Simos at the smuggler's guild, Ierod managed to pull out an unlikely victory – he rolled 5 successes on six dice or something, and she only rolled 2 on seven.
And that's basically where we left off.
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As you will have read, I used very technical descriptions here. Would you rather I try and make it a little more "fictional", i.e. include dialogue and make it more like a story? Just as information for our next game and the next installment.