Session Report 6: Station Street 2

In which the Keepers continue their adventure in Poorfellows. Gav faces off against the Nightfish, Patrizo gangsters who just threw his character's best friend through a window. And of course, Gav recieves a prized relic from the Prince himself.

The Opener: Rill meets with the Ratkings [here's a bit of Fiction I gave for my players- a cutscene about stuff they consequently never actually found out about]

Professor Rill held up a hankerchief to help mask the smell. The sulfurous stench of Poorfellows only was magnified in its sewers. Part of him regretted using the dimension door spell to enter the sewers. Perhaps he should've made his graduate student come up to him rather than venture down himself.

"Too many questions." Rill reminded himself. "And alas, discovery requires experimentation. This experimentation requires secrecy."

"Master Rill?" A gravelly voice questioned, its tone desperate.

A half-rat, half-human head emerged from the dark sewer water before him. Once a young woman, her time exposed to one of the experiment's key processes had marked her permanently. A form of Lycanthropy; albeit a kind that cursed its victim with rat characteristics instead of lupine ones. Wererats. "Is that you?"

"You still haven't learned to control your form?" Rill sighed. "I supposed that's understandable. How goes generating the necessary population for stage two?"

"The experiment still goes slow." She explained, her tone apologetic. "But Master, soon Poorfellows will explode with our numbers."

"How so?"

"A war between the Patrizo and the other gangs... chaos, Master, we found the right kind of chaos. The chaos you asked us for." She crawled up onto the walkway next to his feet. His graduate student nodded in that old sign of singsong madness that occasionally afflicted his students. She wept tears, scared to look up at him.

As it was supposed to be. Rill thought.

"Chaos, Master." Agripa repeated.

"Ah. And this war will provide the right opportunities to expand the local wererat population?"

She nodded eagerly. "Yes! We will slide and worm our way among the wounded. The strongest of them will fall, Master. We will bandage their wounds with our cursed blood. As we speak, the Station Street gang is already starting the first blows with the Nightfish. Each gang will welcome our aid, each gang will fall to our plague."

"And the Keepers are part of that too." Rill mused to himself. "Good work, Agripa. You've gone a long way for this experiment, I'm so proud of you."

Agripa's eyes filled with tears. "Thank you, Master."

"You know how to reach me. Let me know when you are ready to begin stage two." Rill then stepped away, using dimension door spell once again. He enjoyed the escape to the streets of Poorfellows above. Even if the smell didn't change that much.

Scene Question: Do the Keepers agree to a duel with the Nightfish?

Gav faced off against Benvolio Patrizo.  As the fountain overflowed from Patrizo water magic, Gav let loose his own wind magicks, filling the air with a fierce gale.

After a tense conversation, the Keepers learn from Mercuritia Patrizo, the leader of the Nightfish, that the Patrizo have a missing member too: their sister, Julia.  Gav convinces them to depart.

Dafni- a member of Gav's gang and a Bloodrager too- refuses to let the Patrizo get away.  She pulled out a shotgun, carved with bloodrage runes.  The runes and her eyes started to glow with white electricity.  Charging through the door, knocking it over, Ash acted first.  Distracting Dafni, Ash got a Blow to the Head for her trouble.

Pyro, on the other hand, threw a quick tranq bomb, knocking her out with gas.  Dafni went down, as Pyro overcame her rage long enough for the tranquilizing gas to take her out of the conflict.  

With both Aldo and Dafni knocked out, Ishida followed the Patrizo back to their lair.  After a awhile, he learned that the Patrizo didn't know much more than the Keepers did: Mirrabella and their sister were missing, and were last seen together.  The other Keepers spent some time brainstorming a plan: talk to the Gnolls and find out what they know or Gav could talk to his father and others about what was happening.

Scene Question: Does Gav accept the relic the Prince gives him?

Gav and the rest go to investigate things, but first Gav goes to visit his father Santos.  His father lives in the Falcon building, on Station Street, not far from their location.  Once there, in addition to learning his father was asleep- a representative of the Prince has been waiting for Gav.  

Kenzie, a middle-aged bald ursyklon with a odd third eye tattoo on his forehead, wore fine clothes and a lapel with the seal of the city.  After introducing himself politely, Kenzie explained that he had been sent to give Gav something his mother had given the Prince to hold for him.  Until he was old enough to be responsible for it, the Prince made sure it was maintained until Gav could take it for his own.

Kenzie took them across the street to the Station House, a building Gav had never seen anyone ever use or live in.  With a flourish and a key, Kenzie opened the door.  Nonplussed, the Keepers followed, not understanding what Kenzie was explaining.  Inside they found the Station House to be a nice manor house- possibly with fifty or more rooms.  Certainly bigger on the inside than it had been on the street.

Then Kenzie showed them the kicker.  He took them to the Kitchen, where Ash identified the locale in the window.  It was Tengril Square, in the Wolf Quarter.  Which was impossible.  Kenzie then opened the Kitchen door- revealing that it indeed opened in the Wolf Quarter, while the Solar's door opened to Station Street in Poorfellows.  The Station House, Kenzie explains, is also known as the House of 13 Doors.  Each door connects to a different location in Crux.  

The Station House was created by Gav's mother.  Now the Prince was passing it onto Gav to keep and protect.  [I handed Gav's player a whole sheet about the Station House.  He blinked after reading it all.  He caught the dangers of the place quickly.]  Kenzie also helped to wrap up the situation.  He revealed that Mirrabella and Julia were upstairs, that he had let them into the Station House per the Prince's orders, seeing that Gav wouldn't mind doing so.  Also, Kenzie revealed that the two were married.

After a bit of RP between Gav and his gang mates, the Keepers started poking around the Station House.  Its utility quickly was apparent.  Soon they started to think about the sorts of things they could do throughout Crux, given such a easy, fast way to travel.  They just need to find out where the other nine doors they don't know about lead to. 

Conclusion
There was another scene question- but the players never got into a place where that question could even be asked. So it didn't get answer. Which is fine. Players can take shortcuts in my games, I love to adapt.

And that was where I ended it. I also asked my players about it. They enjoyed the twist about the missing character having secretly married a vampire and being able to avoid a fight if they chose. But they also felt like there wasn't enough danger for their characters.

It was a major milestone, however. I upped their power level. From now on I'm going to try and up some of the danger for them. Modify and adapt based on the feedback I received. Hence asking my players.

Overall, this campaign has been great. For my end of things it has been awesome. One goal was to playtest Crux as a setting. Having players ask questions or add details only makes me add more to the city of curses. Its been excellent so far.

In fact, one player asked a few questions on the nature of vampires. I feel obligated to write up more on vampires, to at least something to point to for information for that question.

It definitely adds to my drive to work on this.